I Still Dream About You

Officially on the Market

FORTUNATELY THE OPEN HOUSE WENT WELL. THE ATTENDEES were mostly neighbors and old friends of the Daltons who were curious to see it again. They all had fond memories of being at Crestview at one time or another when they were children. Maggie heard a lot of stories about Edward Crocker from the older ones who had met him. By all accounts, he’d been a shy man but well liked. One older woman shook her head and smiled. “My mother said every girl in Birmingham had high hopes of becoming Mrs. Edward Crocker, but the sly fox was never caught. He was one of those confirmed bachelors, not that he didn’t like the ladies. Mother said he was very good friends with a lot of the married ladies in town. And, of course, he absolutely adored his sister, Edwina. They say that no matter how busy he was, every June, without fail, Edward sailed to Europe and spent three months visiting Edwina at her home in London.”

Later, an older man in a wheelchair came through Crestview and said he had grown up in a house down the hill. He remembered Edward Crocker as being very fond of children. He said when he was boy, Mr. Crocker would let him and all his brothers and sisters ride their ponies all over the property and sent them wonderful presents every Christmas. The more Maggie heard about Edward that day, the more curious she became.

So after everybody left, she went back to the library and looked at the portrait again. This time, she realized what it was about his eyes that she hadn’t noticed before. There was a strange sadness there, almost as if he was longing for something he couldn’t have. Maggie related to that. “But what was it?” she wondered. Edward Crocker had everything in the world a man could want: money and power and Crestview. Even so, he looked lonely. He had not been an only child. He had a sister, so she wondered who it was he was lonely for. Had he been disappointed in love? Had someone broken his heart?

The longer she looked at his face, the more she wished she could have known him.