Helen play-shrieked, and then had to leave Kate for a moment to
ring up a few customers. As soon as she finished the transactions,
she came back and continued the conversation.
?No. I just don?t think it?s that strange for a big family to buy a
big property. Especially if they?re going to live in it year-round. It
makes more sense than some old wealthy couple buying a summer
home that?s so huge they get lost on the way to the mailbox.?
?True,? Kate conceded. ?But I really thought you?d be more interested
in the Delos family. You?ll be graduating with a few of them.?
Helen stood there as Delos ran around her head. The name
meant nothing to her. How could it? But some echoey part of her
brain kept repeating ?Delos? over and over.
?Lennie? Where?d you go?? Kate asked. She was interrupted by
the first members of the book club coming early, wound-up and
already in the throes of wild speculation.
Kate?s prediction was right. The Unbearable Lightness of Being
was no match for the arrival of new year-rounders, especially since
the rumor mill had revealed that they were moving here from
Spain. Apparently, they were Boston natives who had moved to
Europe three years ago in order to be closer to their extended family,
but now, suddenly, they?d decided to move back. It was the
?suddenly? part that everyone spent the most time discussing. The
school secretary had hinted to a few of the book club members that
the kids had been enrolled so far past the normal date that the parents
had practically had to bribe their way in, and all sorts of special
agreements had to be made to ship their furniture over in time
for their arrival. It seemed like the Delos family had left Spain in a
hurry, and the book club agreed that there must have been some
kind of falling-out with their cousins.
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