Theresa Rebeck - Twelve Rooms with a View

“We’ve noticed,” Lucy observed.

“Absolutely. Absolutely.” Betsy Hastings nodded, running her hand over the pocket doors. “A property like this, my advice would be to let a professional pick it up and do the renovation, even at eleven or twelve million it’s going to be considered undervalued, which is good; you want them to see the potential for a fast turnaround and a big profit. You don’t want to get involved in the level of renovation that a place like this would need, to pull in the really big numbers. There are agents out there who will tell you that you could take in twenty or even twenty-two on this, but that’s going to require enormous investment on your part up front and I really would let someone else take care of that.”

“Why don’t you put together a strategy and call me tomorrow,” Lucy nodded, not even looking at her. She held out her card. She did everything but tell Betsy to her face that her wild enthusiasm had completely put her out of the running.

“That’s not to say, if you’re looking for the bigger numbers, I can work with that too,” Betsy explained, taking the card with a little shrug. “This end of the market, it’s always a question of how long you want to wait. If you can afford to take the time and put a few million into it yourself, then we’re talking about significantly larger numbers. It’s just a different approach. As I said, I’d love to work with you on this. Really, it’s a great place. Just the size of it, and the details! I love it when these old places open up. New York. There’s no place like it, there really isn’t, you just get such a sense of history. Fantastic. I’ll give you a call tomorrow, we can go over a couple of different plans.” I had to give it up to that old Betsy Hastings; it was pretty inspired bullshit. I mean, everything she said was true, and she really did have a kind of excitement about the apartment which I totally agreed with. But obviously she was mostly talking about money, which also obviously contributed to the fact that everything she said sounded pretty phony.

So Betsy took off, and then this young kind of swank Indian character showed up and he went into overdrive explaining how if we could take a year and sink a million into the joint and break it down into three separate but spectacular separate apartments we could pick up twenty-two easy. Which made me actually kind of like Betsy even better, because she totally called that, that some other agent was going to show up and tell us this version of events, and then that actually happened like within the hour. And then this older white guy came by, wearing an extremely expensive suit, and he just looked around and acted like the place really wasn’t so great after all, and that the fixtures were all just inappropriate, and the appliances were from the seventies, and he would have to think about whether or not he was interested in taking this on, even if we could work out the legal difficulties. He was the only one who brought up the “legal difficulties” which, perversely, it seemed to me, cheered Lucy up quite a bit; she just shrugged and said something like, “That would be up to you.” He was really pretty snotty, and they were quite snippy with each other, and his approach may have been a posture that he thought would make us want him more, but I’m not sure why he thought that because clearly we were sitting on the mother lode, in real estate terms, legal difficulties or not. Anyway it was all very nerve-wracking by the end of the day, when Daniel and Alison came by so we could have a powwow over Chinese food.

“There’s no way we’re going to be able to push through a sale before they slap a cloud on the title, if that’s their intention, and it sure as hell would be mine,” Lucy explained as she picked pieces of chicken out of one of those little cartons. “It’s going to cost a fortune and the legal tangle will be considerable. What’d your friend tell you, inheritance taxes are due within the year?”

“Six months,” Daniel nodded. “Although it’s apparently not much of a problem getting an extension when the will’s being probated. We can get Wes to file for us if it becomes necessary.”

“When,” said Lucy. “When it’s necessary; there’s no use being naïve about this.”

“How much is this going to cost us?” asked Alison, all worried as usual.

“Much more than we have,” Lucy admitted. “The only way we’re going to be able to afford this is to get into a partnership with a real estate agency. I’m going to talk to Sotheby’s about it tomorrow.

“That guy from Sotheby’s was an asshole. He was the least interested of anybody,” I pointed out.

“That’s how I know he wants it,” Lucy said, spearing a shrimp with slashing efficiency. “We need someone who’s going to be willing to work around the legal problems. Those other two were too spooked to even mention it. Losers.”

“What if Sotheby’s gets behind the Drinan side of this?” I asked.

“I sent over a packet of the documentation. They’ll look at it and decide, but it’s pretty clear we’re going to win.” Lucy shrugged.

“How can you be so sure? I just don’t know how you can talk about all of this like you know what’s going to happen. How could anyone know what’s going to happen?” asked Alison. “You keep acting like this is all going to just work out and I don’t see how you can know that.” I thought this was a pretty good point but Lucy didn’t even respond. Daniel reached for some beef and broccoli thing, and he didn’t bother answering Alison either. “These legal situations aren’t sure. They never are,” she persisted. “And if we spend all our money, if our money isn’t enough to cover the costs, costs can go through the roof and instead of everything what if we end up with nothing?”

“ Alison ,” Daniel finally said, impatient. “I spent the day on the phone with four different lawyers; all of them gave us the same answer. This is a no-brainer. We’re in the clear.”

“If it’s so totally clear that we’re going to win this, how come it’s all such a surprise to those Drinans?” I said. “I mean, they knew that he was leaving it all to Mom.”

“They told you that?” said Lucy. “Wait a minute. They told you that they knew he was leaving the place to Mom?”

“They didn’t say it. I just kind of figured it out,” I said, eating. “Anyway, they definitely knew.”

“That he was leaving the place to Mom.”

“Yeah, they knew that part. But they totally didn’t know the rest, that then we would show up and get it. Like, why would they know that part but not the other part?”

“What else did they say?” asked Daniel. He sounded even more uptight so I looked up from the Chinese food finally, and they were all staring at me. For a second I considered lying some more, because I was beginning to feel like Lucy and Alison and Daniel were acting like such unbelievable sharks, that’s what they deserved. But I didn’t see any point in protecting those Drinans either. It was hard to know whose team I was on, already. And we had only been at this for a day and a half.

“They were just sad and drunk and kind of mad, that’s all. I shrugged, opting for a vague non-answer for now. “One of them talked about all the furniture being gone like it was so sad. Like he was a little surprised, I think, that so much of it was gone.”

“Why would that surprise him?” Alison asked.

“Not totally surprised. But sad. Like they hadn’t seen the place in a little while, like they knew what it was like in here but not all the way. Sort of like that.”

“They probably weren’t allowed in very much.” Lucy stared into her spicy shrimp, putting it all together. “By all accounts Bill was a Howard Hughes-level freak. Then when he died, if Mom didn’t want them around, she didn’t have to let them in. Maybe she was afraid they’d try and kick her out. They probably would’ve tried to kick her out; they haven’t been exactly civil, have they? Anyway it was only three weeks ago, they didn’t exactly have a ton of time to figure out a game plan. They probably didn’t even know they needed a game plan. Most people don’t think ahead.”