Carol was younger than Ann thought she’d be, maybe thirty-five, about Ann’s own age, and she was ruggedly attractive. She was cool, even for someone who chose to live on the lonely outermost Cape year-round, a coolness that Ann thought was wasted here. It would serve her better someplace more hip and urban, like Boston or New York. Ann thought Carol’s beauty was wasted here, too, with so few people to appreciate it. She had big, watchful eyes and a heap of curly blond hair piled on top of her head. She wore an artsy purple A-line skirt made out of thick sailcloth material that looked heavy and uncomfortable and swished when she walked. Unlike Carol’s thick wool tights, Ann’s hose were sheer, and her frozen toes were stuffed into black, pointy pumps with straps around the ankles. Ann followed Carol from room to room, the sound of her stupid heels like pickaxes digging into ice when they clicked against the hardwood plank floors. It was an odd sound in a place where everyone had always gone barefoot.

“So, what do you think?”

“About the price?” Carol paused to lean into the fireplace to look up into the flue. “Well, it’s hard to say. Houses like this don’t usually come on the market.”

“It’s one of the oldest on the Cape,” Ann said, feeling a tingle of pride combined with sadness. “It’s one of a kind.”

Carol said, “Actually, there are plenty of antique saltboxes in Wellfleet.”

“They say the house was made from the wood of a merchant boat that was stranded in the cove. It’s old. Really old.” Ann looked around at the historic putty-colored oil trim that was thankfully untouched, just like the flinty woodblock-print wallpaper sagging against the walls. Until that afternoon, seeing the house through Carol’s eyes, she hadn’t noticed how stained and worn it looked, as though it had been exposed to a fire. She was so familiar with the house that she didn’t even see it anymore, the way she could listen to an old song she’d heard a thousand times on the radio and not really hear it.

“Oh, I’m not disputing that the house has an interesting history,” Carol said. “I’m sure your buyer will want to learn everything you know about it. What’s unique is that it’s coming on the market in the first place. Out here, old houses usually stay in the family.” The way Carol said it made Ann feel like she was being judged, like her whole family had failed. And they had.

“So, tell me,” Carol said. “Why are you selling this treasure?”

“Treasure” sounded good, or maybe Carol was mocking her? Ann couldn’t tell. This bothered her, because she liked to think she usually could tell these things. “My sister and I think selling makes the most sense.”