Thirteen Orphans by Jane Lindskold Read Free Book Online

carried.

    “Shall I help you with that?” he asked.

    “Please,” Auntie Pearl said. “They are quite heavy, and I would not drop them.”

    “No,” Gaheris agreed, taking the box with what Brenda thought looked like reverence. “I think not.”

    Hastings was told that they would be some time, and so he could have the next several hours for his own business.

    “I may not drive back home tonight,” Pearl said. “If I take rooms here, I will call you.”

    The driver nodded. “I had thought this might be the case, madam. Call if I am needed.”

    He bowed, slid into the car, and drove off.

    “Polite fellow,” Gaheris commented. “Where did you get him? Central casting?”

    “Just about,” Pearl agreed with a light laugh. “Young would-be actors always need work. Driving for me is not terribly onerous, and I am understanding if a casting call comes up suddenly. Sometimes, I even unbutton enough to reminisce about my successes. Hastings has dreams of understudying the lead in a traveling Broadway show. I do not doubt that he will ensconce himself somewhere and memorize lines until I call.”

    The idle chatter had carried them to the bank of elevators. As they shared the elevator car with a couple of earnest-looking young men in suits, further talk waited until they arrived at the suite Gaheris had taken for himself and Brenda.

    It was a nice set of rooms, not unduly lavish, but roomy. The front room was comfortably furnished with a sofa and two chairs with a low coffee table stretched between them. Off to one side was a small kitchenette. A square table, about the size of a card table, sat surrounded by four chairs, ready either for meetings or meals. Brenda knew that later she and her dad would flip a coin for which of them got the bed in the other room, which would sleep on the sofa bed out here.

    “There’s tea,” Gaheris said, glancing at a narrow wicker basket beside the two-burner stove, “and coffee. I can get sodas and ice, or order room service, if you’d like.”

    Dad must be rattled, Brenda thought, feeling herself smile. He never orders room service. Or maybe he wants to be kind to Auntie Pearl. But, looking at him, I think he’s rattled.

    “I see Earl Grey there,” Auntie Pearl said. “I think I can settle for that. I also have a box of absolutely overly rich chocolate truffles here. I hope you two will share them with me.”

    Brenda felt a momentarily selfish joy that she wouldn’t have to share her own treasure trove, then ashamed of herself.

    “I have my chocolates, too,” she said. “Dad, I think I’d like coffee rather than tea. We got up really early this morning to fly out here. My head’s muddled with everything that has happened.”

    Dad moved to set up the coffeepot, and when Brenda put her box of chocolates on the table in front of the sofa, Auntie Pearl waved for her to put them away.

    “Keep those for later,” Pearl said. “That’s an expensive treasure, and one to be savored. You may never have anything like it again. I assure you, these truffles will be more than enough for us all.”

    Gaheris turned from setting up the coffee, and glanced at the two boxes with their “Your Chocolatier” labels.

    “You decided to raise Albert’s profit margin?”

    “No,” Auntie Pearl said, and her tone held a challenge Brenda could not quite understand. “Albert gave them to us by way of an apology for his being late.”

    “Gave you?” Dad turned and picked up Brenda’s box. “This is a half-pound sampler! Those run something like two hundred dollars, especially in that box. I remember thinking about getting Keely one for our anniversary, and decided that if I was spending that much she’d prefer something more permanent.”

    Auntie Pearl nodded. “And Albert didn’t even offer you a discount, did he? Yet he gave Brenda and me our little gifts with a smile. That’s not the only odd thing he did.”

    Succinctly, she summarized the events that had