time I do not understand.’
‘Let me explain. I can’t really give this house to you, because it’s already yours;
you’ve paid for it. But, as a legality, title still rests in me. Sometime this
coming week we’ll change that, vest title in you. It is legal for a married woman to
own real property in her own name in this state as long as the deed describes you as
a married woman and I waive claim… and even that last is no ‘more than a
precaution. Now as to how you bought it -‘
I bought it flat on my back, I did, `ringing the cash register’. The down payment
was money Brian had saved while in the Army, plus money from a third mortgage his
parents had accepted from him. This let him make a sizeable, down payment, with a
first mortgage at the usual six per cent and a second mortgage at eight and a half
per cent. The house was rented when he bought it; Brian kept the tenants, invested
the rent to help pay off the mortgages.
The Howard bonus for Nancy cleared that too-expensive second mortgage; Carol’s birth
paid off Brian’s parents. The Foundation’s payment for Brian, Junior, let Brian,
Senior, refinance the first mortgage down to the point where the rental income let
him at last clear the property in May 1906, only six and a half years after he had
assumed this huge pyramid of debt.
Briney is a gambler; I told him so.
`Not really,’ he answered, `as I was betting on you, darling. And you delivered.
Like clockwork. Oh, Brian junior was a little later than I expected but the plan had
some flexibility in it. While I had insisted on the privilege of paying off the
first mortgage ahead of time, I didn’t actually have to pay it earlier than June
first, 1910. But you came through like the champion you are.’
A year ago he had discussed his projected programme with his tenants; a date was
agreed on; they had moved out quite amicably just the Friday past. `So it’s yours,
darling. I did not renew our lease this time; Hennessy O’Scrooge knows we are
leaving. We can move out tomorrow and move in here, if this house pleases you. Or
shall we sell it?’
`Don’t talk about selling our housel Briney, if this truly is your wedding present
to me, then at last I can make my bride’s present to you. Your kitten.’
He grinned. ‘Our kitten, you mean. Yes, I had figured that out.’
We had postponed getting a kitten because there were dogs on both sides of the
little house on 26th – and one of them was a cat killer. By moving around the corner
we had not gotten away from that menace.
Brian showed me around the place. It was a wonderful house: upstairs a big bathroom
and a smaller one, a little bathroom downstairs adjacent to a maid’s room, four
bedrooms and a sleeping porch, a living-room, a parlour, a proper dining-room with a
built-in china closet and a plate rail, a gas log in the parlour in what could be a
fireplace for logs if the gas log was removed, a wonderful big kitchen, a formal
front staircase and a convenient back staircase leading from the kitchen, privately
oh, just everything and anything that a family with children could want, including a
fenced back yard just right for children and pets… and for croquet and picnic
dinners and a vegetable garden and a sand pile. I started to cry again.
‘Stop it,’ ordered Briney. ‘This one is the master bedroom. Unless you prefer
another room.’
It was a fine, big, airy room, with that sleeping porch off it. The house was empty
and reasonably clean (I looked forward to scrubbing every inch), but some items not
worth hauling away had been left here and there.
‘Briney, that old porch swing out there has a pad on it. Would you please bring that
pad in?’
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‘If you wish. Why?’
‘Let’s ring the cash register!’
‘Right away, Madam! Honey, I wondered how long it would take you to decide to