Excerpt #4
By Golda Wolfe
All rights reserved by the author.
The simplest explanation for why Baron von Lingenhoven felt tired every morning was that he did not sleep well. His ex-partner Buzz White was so enthralled by Vail’s skiing that he had forgotten to mention the traffic grinding day and night along the interstate that cut the resort in two. European friends who had visited Vail in summer as well as winter had warned Von Lingenhoven about this. In St. Moritz he could sleep with his windows open to allow the cold breezes to caress his face, while the goose down comforter kept his body warm. The windows in his Vail hotel room didn’t open more than four inches, which he assumed was so that guests plagued by insomnia weren’t driven to throw themselves out of them. The grating of enchained 18-wheelers on the snow-packed six lanes of concrete highway that ran beside the five-star hotel still seeped in through the windows’ sliver of an opening, making deep sleep impossible at $1,200 a night.
The sympathetic concierge offered a water feature for white noise at an extra $100. Rather than add another layer of superficiality, Von Lingenhoven shut his windows completely. On the last day, Bob and Linda Chase invited him back to their house for cocktails and appetizers. Another couple, introduced to Erik at the bar as the Fullers, were invited to join them. As the Chases drove from the parking lot in the village to their house, Linda reminded Von Lingenhoven that this was one of their three homes.
“Oh right, you mentioned that you are from Dallas and live there too,” he said. “Where is your third house?”
“We wanted a place on the ocean, so we have a big condo in Newport Beach,” said Linda. Their social calendar was so full in Texas and California that they could only spend six weeks a year at their Vail house. They came for two weeks in winter and four weeks in summer.
The Chases’ Vail home was one of those towering piles built in the locally fashionable Tuscan-Colorado mine shaft style that eluded Von Lingenhoven’s architectural knowledge. Six bedrooms, each with its own bathroom suite, sprouted from the structure’s five levels. The house could comfortably accommodate 15 overnight guests. Linda whispered to him that she preferred leaving the extra bedrooms unoccupied.
“When we filled them up with kids and friends I felt like we were running a hotel,” she said. “I like it better when our little hotel has vacancies. I mean, you know we never felt like we were on vacation when we had people staying with us for their vacation . . .
“Ok, everybody come outside and see the sunset.” Linda handed each guest a crystal tulip of Prosecco as she directed them to the highest deck leading off the kitchen.
“We feel blessed to have an ocean view at our California house and this mountain one,” said Bob, surveying his domain from the deck.
The rush hour clamor floated up from far below, although neither the vehicles nor the time, as far as Von Lingenhoven could tell, was moving quickly. It made him wonder whether the occupants of the matching mansions clinging to both sides of the highway were deaf to the stereophonic blight of the valley’s geology. No Vail home price seemed high enough to buy quiet, or anything more pristine than an eagle-eye view of Interstate 70. To the west the vermilion lip line of the sun was sinking below a ridge deformed by more hulking residences. Christmas cheer paved aspen and pine trees in lambent red, white and green lights.
After a few minutes the guests were too cold to stay out. Linda shepherded them into the living room and corralled them in the semi-circular sofa that could seat ten. Once within its spacious confines conversation resumed.
“So, Bob told me you are a museum director in Vienna,” said Ken Fuller. They could finally converse in a normal tone of voice.
“That’s correct.”
“What sort of museum is this?”
“I am embarking on the establishment of a new museum dedicated to pre-war Austrian Jewish craftmakers,” said von Lingenhoven. “It’s called Museum Osterreichischer Judischer Macher. Again, he translated the museum’s name. “Or we say just call it MOJM.”
“Do you mean it will have the great art that Nazis stole from their Jewish owners?” Ken asked. Legal battles over Austria’s repatriation of art to Jewish descendants of murdered families were much in the news.
“No,” said the Baron, gearing up to give his usual explanation. “Our museum will show something quite different.”