Christmas at Holiday House - RaeAnne Thayne Page 0,29
wasn’t a vast historic mansion with plenty of room to store her various collections.”
She picked up a nutcracker that was about twenty inches tall with a thick hairy mustache and a bushy black beefeater hat. “Are they antiques?”
“Some of them are. I think a few of them are museum quality from the 1700s. But Winnie always says the beauty of her collection is that no one can tell the valuable pieces from those she bought at yard sales and thrift stores. I’m not sure even she knows.”
The longer she was here, the more she found it charming. She could imagine some people could spend hours looking at each whimsical creation.
Winnie had talked about putting up Christmas trees in some of the bedrooms. There was an empty space next to the window that would be perfect, and some of the smaller nutcrackers would look charming as ornaments. She jotted a note down and then turned back to Ethan.
“I suppose you had better show me the rest.”
His teeth gleamed with his smile. “Prepare yourself.”
He led her to the room next door and flipped on the light. This time, Abby was prepared for the sight that greeted them—hundreds of angels, large and small. A few appeared to be suspended in air around the giant four-poster bed. When she looked closer, she saw they were hanging by clear fishing wire. Still more angels graced the top of several antique-looking tables around the room.
Even the paintings on the wall contained angels in various poses.
“When I was a kid, I never wanted to sleep in this room, even if Winnie would have let me. It creeped me out. I don’t mean angels. I’ve got no problem with them, but one or two are enough for me, thanks. An entire flock is a little much for a ten-year-old boy.”
“I can imagine,” she said, though she had a hard time picturing him as a boy running through these halls.
She had a feeling one problem the Silver Belles would have with their plans for Christmas at Holiday House was the time element. People would want to linger in each room to examine all the treasures contained inside.
“She must have been collecting these things for years.”
“Winnie likes to say that if she has the money and spends a good percentage already on charity, why can’t she use some of it to buy things that bring her joy?”
“Good point.”
“I can’t argue. I mean, my father spends plenty on yachts and vacation homes in the Caribbean. Winnie spends maybe twenty dollars a Saturday at yard sales and thrift stores around the area.”
The angels definitely made a statement. She was particularly drawn to three cherubs on top of a display case who looked down with varying expressions of interest.
“I don’t have words,” she said honestly.
He laughed. “Yeah. It’s a lot to take in. And we’re not done yet.”
The next room contained a huge train that ran on a track around a multilevel Christmas village made up of houses, churches, ice-skating ponds. She made a note that she would definitely have to bring Christopher into this room, though she would have to supervise him closely.
The room after that was entirely ringed by shelves that contained at least a hundred Nativity scenes. The crèche room, Ethan had called it.
“These are actually mostly valuable,” he explained. “All of Winnie’s friends and extended family members know she collects Nativities. As long as I can remember, everyone sends them to her from their travels. My grandfather started it and my great-uncle Thomas and his husband carried on the tradition. I imagine Lucy alone has probably sent her at least a dozen from around the world.”
“They’re gorgeous, especially all clustered together in here.”
“She has a few larger Nativities she likes to set up downstairs. I imagine she will direct you where they go.”
“I could spend all day looking at them.”
“When we were kids, Lucy and I always loved to look at the Nativities. Our favorite is the one in the coconut shell.”
She liked this version of Ethan so much more than the somewhat autocratic, commanding man she had met the day before. She remembered his sweetness with Rodrigo and felt that tug of attraction again.
Back out in the hallway, she scribbled a few more notes down in her book.
“The other bedrooms on this level aren’t as kitschy and won’t take nearly as much time to go through. Winnie has left many of the original Victorian furnishings from the time the house was used as a summer home by William