The House at Royal Oak (23 page)

It finally happened, of course, after we had given up hope—the day we stopped being come-heres. Naturally, it had everything to do with the arrival in our midst of new newcomers. Car break-ins were occurring at the time, a first as far as anyone could remember. People who had never locked car or house doors before started locking up at night. Hugo, Susie, Scott, and I, out for pizza with two new weekend neighbors from Manhattan, were concerned that house robberies might be next.

A few days before, Scott had told Hugo he moved his guns upstairs—just in case. Speaking clearly, so all of us could hear, Scott asked if Hugo had moved his guns upstairs yet. I saw immediately what he was up to and admired the subtle reference to the 1812 British attack on St. Michaels when townspeople, according to legend, moved lights up to the church belfry and high windows.

“Yep.”

“Good,” Scott nodded, as Kurt's eyes widened. “Shells, too?”

“Yep,” Hugo said again.

“Guns? Upstairs? You have a gun?” Kurt looked at Hugo with incredulity, betrayal in his voice. He all but said,
I thought you were like us.

“Glad to hear you took the advice.” Scott was savoring the effect of the conversation on the newcomers. “Makes sense, doesn't it? I mean no reason to take chances.”

Hugo nodded gravely. I managed to wait until we got home for a high five.

THESE DAYS FRIENDS AND ACQUAINTANCES DRIVE OUT
from Washington or from one of the airports in spring or summer, sometimes calling ahead, sometimes not. They look over the house and garden, and settle on the porch with a cool drink before asking the question. So: How do you like retirement?

No one hears the answer, I think, because what we do doesn't look exactly like work. Conversation proceeds. They comment on the restful setting and propose activities like bicycling, sailing or kayaking, doing the Maritime Museum, and finishing up with dinner.

Lovely plans, Hugo and I have learned to respond. Have fun and we'll meet you for dinner if it's not too late. It's awkward to point out that they are on vacation and we're not. If pressed, one of us will start listing the day's tasks: reservations to confirm, phone requests to answer, shopping for breakfast because our tiny kitchen has little storage space. If it isn't the housekeeper's day to help and one or more rooms has to be “turned,” meaning guests are checking out and new ones are arriving on their heels, then Hugo and I will do it. A
pillowcase might need touching up if the housekeeper forgot to iron in sharp creases. I insist on this because it's the only way a guest can be certain the pillowcase is absolutely fresh. Once, when I knew the incoming guest was a surgeon, I even ironed the top sheet. This alarmed Hugo.

“Nice of you,” he said. “But probably not necessary.” I knew a surgeon would notice, but Hugo clearly thought my obsessive tendency was out of control.

If visitors don't get the picture yet, I'll continue with the list: yard trim to rake, garden benches to wash, walkways and steps to sweep, fresh flowers to cut, and maybe less routine matters, like ordering business cards or checking the minutes of the business association meeting to see if any new regulations are being planned for bed-and-breakfasts. Inspecting bed-and-breakfast kitchens, a recent rule, was clearly good for the industry. We were less sure about the one requiring bed-and-breakfasts that offer complimentary sherry to registered guests to serve it to anyone who walks in off the street and asks for it. We chose not to share news of that particular regulation around the neighborhood except with trusted friends.

The usual is to start work early so breakfast prep can be finished before going out for dinner with friends. Hugo has tried it the other way, starting kitchen work after a leisurely evening out, but by then guests in the bedroom above the kitchen are usually back from their evening and trying to sleep. He can't turn on the mixer, sauté peppers and onions, which means switching on a noisy vent fan, or let pans clank without disturbing the guests.

Eventually, if not when friends arrive then by the next day, the idea may dawn on them that we have not “retired.”
It is redefinition or dreamchasing, maybe some of both. It is definitely work.

As for those who don't get it, I've decided that if they want to think of us as “retired,” so be it. I choose to consider it a compliment, the sign of a job done well enough that it seems effortless.

Back at the museum I found myself explaining to the summer interns that we didn't spend all day in the galleries looking at art and that I closed the express mail office more nights a year than I wanted to count. In this regard little has changed. I find myself explaining that we don't sit on the porch all day sipping mint juleps. What I don't say, because our visitors are in an up, light mood: When you've come this close to losing everything, it's all good and, exactly as my sister had foreseen, it's all easy.

The bed-and-breakfast community proved welcoming locally and beyond. After several seasons I was surprised one afternoon by a phone call from the state bed-and-breakfast association asking if Hugo would be willing to inspect a bed-and-breakfast that was applying for membership. Hugo said he didn't feel qualified to pass judgment on others. I reminded him that we had passed the state's 135-point inspection with high marks. The purpose of this inspection is to ensure the public of basic standards of safety, comfort, and convenience. Criteria include general cleanliness, appropriate amenities for guests like good reading lights, adequate exterior lighting, general procedures for greeting and serving guests, and attractiveness of the décor. Plus, there's a check of basic sanitation procedures, such as how food and dishware are handled.

Believing that Hugo deserved this after all he had done to get us up and running, I had another motive in encouraging him to accept the assignment. The inn to be inspected was a beautiful old plantation house with history. Shackles for slaves could still be seen attached to the basement walls, people said, because the house served as a stop on the Underground Railroad and fleeing slaves were confined at night. There were two reasons for this. One was to prevent a maverick from harming those who were sheltering them. The second was also to protect the homeowners: If a posse pursuing fleeing slaves came by, an owner could demonstrate that he had already captured them. I wanted Hugo to see this basement.

After a tour by the current owner, which did not include the basement, and the inspection, he ventured to ask about any Civil War history connected with the house. The period has not been well documented and preserved in our region and only lately have some important stations on the Underground Railroad been uncovered, discussed, and mapped out.

“There isn't any,” she answered. “Absolutely none.”

Hugo came home pleased with his new job of bed-and-breakfast inspector, even if some aspects of life here remained opaque, and probably always would.

I guess everything's set, I thought for the last time, with two solid years behind us. We've got the hang of this reinvented life. It's not easy for older dogs to learn new tricks but it looks like we somehow renewed a house, and ourselves along with it. The doctors pronounced Hugo's comeback miraculous. The catastrophe brought us closer than I could have dreamed. He still couldn't drive for more than an hour
at a time, which meant I had to go along whenever he went to a doctor's office, to see his dad, or any distance at all. He still took a nap or two most days and he still forgot things like locking doors at night, closing his office window before a storm, paying bills on time—trivialities.

As for the bed-and-breakfast, bookings continued to flow in. The pain I got in my chest when money was tight let up. Each season after the first was busier than the one before, with tourists, weekenders, and brides-to-be booking for their guests, families, and sometimes themselves. Almost everyone is pleasant and fits the profile of the typical bed-and-breakfast guest: affluent, sophisticated, and seeking a pleasant alternative to the commercial hotel experience. Hotels and large inns have been trying to tap into the bed-and-breakfast market, but until they come up with truly personal service, freshly prepared meals with authentic ingredients and flavors, until they decorate with genuine furniture rather than made-for-hotels reproductions and plastic-lined curtains—the business, according to analysts, seems reasonably secure. Of course there are clouds on the horizon.

Guest expectations are on the rise. Once a bed-and-break-fast, a British invention, promised not much more than that, a concept that didn't flower on this side of the Atlantic. The traditional British bed-and-breakfast was, and is, a relatively inexpensive, no-frills form of accommodation, often with a bath shared with other guests and breakfast served at the host family's own table. In this country guests seek luxurious amenities and facilities. How thick are your towels? the newsletter of the national innkeeper association asks. What is the thread count of your sheets? How many courses do you offer
for breakfast? Do you provide WiFi, computers, Jacuzzis, in-room telephones, voice mail, and flat-screen TV? Do you offer breakfast in the room as an alternative to the dreaded communal breakfast table? Do you have separate entrances for the guests? A pool, a sauna, a massage room? If not, the association advises, consider adding these and as many other luxuries as you can conjure.

Another cloud is the ever-increasing cost of the real estate necessary to house all this luxury. The
Wall Street Journal
calls the American bed-and-breakfast, as it has evolved, endangered. Unless you already happen to own the real estate, it now takes an establishment with many guest rooms, booked more than just seasonal weekends, to pay the bills. Ten rooms is the number often given. As the president of the Maryland Bed and Breakfast Association, Joseph Lespier, points out, the average length of bed and breakfast ownership is seven years; the average age of the innkeepers is over fifty-five; in Maryland more are going out of business than are opening up. “Do the math,” he observes. “In ten years, at this rate, there won't be a significant number of bed-and-breakfasts left in Maryland.”

Still, the bed-and-breakfast, with its invitation to escape into a more romantic, bygone era and relax over an inviting breakfast, has become an established tradition. More accurately, it is a group of traditions with bed-and-breakfasts as different as snowflakes, as individualistic as their hosts. There are bed-and-breakfasts with books, easy chairs, and reading lights. Others specialize in skiing, cooking classes, breadmaking, spa treatments, horseback riding, wine tasting, yoga, theater, ghosts, musicmaking, ballroom dancing, or murder
mysteries. There are bed-and-breakfasts in vineyards and on flower farms and I visited one recently with a wolf protection program and some forty wolves in residence on the grounds. All manner of experience awaits enjoyment. If enforced conviviality isn't for you, just ask before booking at a particular bed-and-breakfast. Speaking with the owner or innkeeper is an excellent way to find out about the general ambience and determine if you will feel comfortable.

For the time being, I decided not to worry about the long-term implications of the business. We were fortunate to have enough guests coming our way to keep going, even without Jacuzzis and television. A neighbor stopped me as I came out of the post office and remarked on how much we've done for the village by fixing up the house and opening a business. Since we arrived, the closed-up general store became a café-restaurant. Other neighbors have put lights like ours in their windows. The latest newcomers, the ones from New York, got an all-out welcome from the neighborhood. The place is brighter, through the efforts of many. That's more than enough.

For the last time ever I think,
we're all set. . .

It's the middle of September. I half-listen to a weather report on the radio before falling asleep. A hurricane is moving up the Atlantic Coast and predictions are that it may veer left and roar straight up the Chesapeake Bay. As far away as Washington, D.C., sandbags are being piled along the Potomac River.

Not directly on the bay, we expect heavy wind and rain—nothing to worry about. I fall into a peaceful sleep.

At dawn, Hugo shakes me awake. I know we have guests checking in, but I don't want to get up yet. He's hunched over, looking out the window.

He points down Royal Oak Road. “Look.”

From the window as far as I can see before the road curves away toward the church, the road looks exactly the way it always does in the rain—shiny and black.

“No, look at the fire truck.” With lights flashing, a fire truck moves silently past our driveway. The water, he points out, reaches almost to the top of the truck's huge wheels.

I look again, tear out of bed, and run downstairs. Stepping into duck boots and throwing a slicker over my nightgown, I rush outside. Hugo, in pajamas, follows.

Water, coming from I don't know where, laps the hubcaps of my car, which is parked near the bottom of the driveway. “Get the car keys,” I yell, always better at giving orders than taking action. While he moves the car to higher ground, I try to make sense of what I see.

The road is definitely under a lot of water. In the dim light I make out that the spacious lawn across the way has vanished. The lower trunks of the old oaks and cedars are submerged in a lakeful of water. The garden bench and putting green are gone. Where the volleyball net used to be, I see the tops of two poles. Overnight we have become a waterfront property.

Not knowing what else to do, we go inside and fill pans with drinking water in case the power goes off, which means the well pump won't work. I hunt for candles and flashlight batteries while Hugo takes phone calls from the incoming guests, all canceling. The wedding has been moved to Baltimore.

The TV news reports that all roads around us are flooded. The Tilghman Island road is closed and Route 33 is under water at the Oak Creek Bridge. Even if we could get to the Bay Bridge, it too is closed because of high winds. We cannot go anywhere.