Gift of the Golden Mountain Read Free Page A

asked, her eyes scanning the leg cast.
         "My tap dancing debut has had to be canceled," I answered, determined to make light of it, then ruining the effect by blurting, "You shouldn't have come, Sara darling—but I'm so glad that you did."
         She grasped her cane with both hands and lowered herself into the chair beside the daybed. Then she held hard to my hand and said nothing. Catching her breath, she looked out to the garden.
         "Weeds are taking over," she offered with what sounded like a sigh of acceptance. "It used to be such a pretty place."
         Alarmed, and feeling a need to reassure her I said, "It will be again, Sara. It's not as tangled as it looks. You know my theory on gardens—planned disorganization. I'll have it set right in a few days, just as soon as I get back on my feet."
         "Yes," Sara said briskly, as if she had turned away from the business at hand and was now turning back, "and how soon will that be?"
         "The doctor says six weeks, maybe a bit more—it seems to have been a rather complicated fracture—before I can get around."
         "What does he mean by 'get around'?"
         I knew Sara in this mood; it was no good to put her off. "I think he means get around enough to do for myself. As far as my going back to the studio, that will be awhile."
         "How much of awhile?" Sara could be relentless.
         "Six months, probably." I coughed nervously, but made myself add what the doctor had said was more likely: "Maybe longer."
         "Then we have to find you a gardener, don't we?"
         I laughed, relieved. Sara had not given up, after all. I touched her face, and for an instant she seemed herself again: not old, not ill, but filled with plans. For a long moment we looked at each other, remembering.
         Sara allowed a contented silence to gather before proceeding. "How old are you, Faith?"
         "How old?" I repeated, as if it was the question I didn't understand and not the reason for it.
         "Sixty-one," I answered.
         "Sixty-one," Sara repeated with a small lament of a sigh and then, catching herself, she added, "Oh to be that young again!"
         I relaxed. We were on familiar ground now, having bridged the gap of time and events that had separated us for so many of the past months—Sara's heart trouble, my fall.
         "I came for a reason," Sara offered, holding to my hand, "I need to ask a very large favor of you."
         I nodded but said nothing, knowing that whatever she had in mind would be couched in terms of a favor to her. It was Sara's way.
         "Before she died," Sara began, "My dear Lena left all of her journals and her correspondence as well, in my care. There is quite a volume—letters she received from others, notably Porter and his father, and letters she wrote to them. Some are copies she made herself, others Porter gave me when he came back from the war, along with his papers." She paused, frowned. "He gave them to me for safekeeping, you see. Porter's the one who suggested I collect all the papers in what he calls 'the family archive.'"
         Suddenly, Sara's voice grew weak. Wanting to give her time to recover, I broke in: "I can still see Lena sitting at the little desk in your library during the war, the morning light flooding in from the east window . . . a perfect Matisse subject!"
         Sara smiled, reviving to the thought of Lena. "She did write wonderful letters," she said, braced by the memory. "She always chided me so for preferring the telephone."
         "So," she went on, "I have six boxes filled with all sorts of letters and papers and journals, and I must see to their safekeeping. Some are of historical significance, at least in California. Kit's father, you know, was a classmate of Teddy Roosevelt. They corresponded, and there are pictures of him at the ranch. In fact, there are at least six more boxes of photographs . . . the Reades were great picture-takers, and you have