He leaned back in his chair, took off his glasses, and polished them with a handkerchief before answering me. When he finally looked up again, there was something almost like pity in his eyes.
“Your husband was a complicated man,” he said quietly.
I remember actually laughing once, a small humorless sound.
“No,” I said. “George was the least complicated man I ever met.”
Mr. Thompson put his glasses back on and folded his hands together.
“With respect, Mrs. Pierce, there are some things about your husband that are not mine to explain. He made me promise. But he also made me promise that if anything happened to him, you would receive the keys and the choice would be yours. All I ask is that you see the property before you decide to sell it.”
“What’s there?” I asked.
He hesitated.
Then he said, “Something worth understanding.”
For a week I carried those keys in my purse without touching them.