Wentfield House by Gail Hilliard Amaral
Andrea felt the rush of excitement when the plane touched down on the runway at Heathrow. She finally allowed herself to feel what she had been denying for weeks: that she wanted to be back in England more than anything. The guilt of leaving her family again had suppressed the happiness that was in her heart. She had previously been in England for graduate school. When she made the difficult decision to return home to the US, Andrea planned to stick by it. There were plenty of museums in the States where she could find work as a curator.
When Andrea left England only six months ago, she was sure she would not work there again. She would just be a tourist with a one week stay and a t-shirt that said, “I love London.” However, her grad school professor, Jane, could be persuasive. More than Jane’s coercion, though, was the lure of Wentfield House. Four hundred years of history that had been locked away; paintings by the masters, and artifacts that spoke of the participation of a family in the major turning points of British history. It was time the world saw these artifacts and it was a curator’s dream to put together a museum to show it all. These houses were dinosaurs – big, old and expensive. The patriarch, George Wentfield, had to find a way to breathe new life into Wentfield House. It belonged to his family, and he would not lose it.
George, with his 60-year-old son, Richard, came up with a plan to unlock the attics and bring 400 hundred years of Wentfield history to the world. The centerpiece would be the museum showcasing the history of Wentfield House and the family that lived there, past and present. George was determined that Wentfield House would be presented to the public with dignity and class. It would not become a safari park with a carnival atmosphere, as one owner had done to a nearby estate. But Richard died suddenly. He did not live to bring these plans to fruition and George’s mind at age 92 has begun to slip.
Richard’s brooding son, James, felt the weight of trying to save Wentfield House killed his father. Along with his grieving mother, James grudgingly continued the plans to save the house. James will do his duty for his grandfather and his family, and he will be drawn together with Andrea. In some ways, Andrea is a beacon of hope to bring this family out of mourning, build the museum, and preserve Richard’s dream of keeping the estate. But she must also convince James it is worth doing. He just as easily could sell all the artifacts and antiques, all the “stuff” as he calls it, and leave Wentfield House to be the shell of what it once was.
Can Andrea change James’ mind about keeping Wentfield House? Will she do it not only for the love of a grand house but also for her love for James, that grows stronger every day?
