Chapter 12 All the “open doors” had slammed in our faces, and now we were almost afraid to reach out to turn any shiny new knobs that popped into view.

We scoured the papers religiously, and through a real estate ad in the Sunday Bulletin we made contact with a charming Irishman.

“Call me Andy!”

The second place he showed us was THE PINK CHATEAU!

“It’s not listed on the market, yet.  However, I think that this retirement home will soon be going out of business.  The couple who own it have a highly successful nursing home in the city, and that occupies most of their attention.  Let’s drive around it and tramp through the grounds.  Maybe they’ll show us through. 

I shall describe it to you.  I’m not long on architecture, so this is strictly from the kitchen.  The front doorway looked a bit blank-faced to me.  There was no shrubbery to speak of,  not a bush to soften the stucco, just a very rutty driveway doing a huge figure eight directly in front of the house.  On the steeply pitched roof, bedecked by many gabled windows on the third floor, long fingers of melted tar caressed the green-gray slate roof and then hid behind the sagging shutters.

There was a walking garden to one  side with tick-tack-toe paths crisscrossing under hand-holding linden trees.  Nestling alongside this peaceful retreat was a forlorn tennis court which had not heard “ 15-love” for many a year.  Beyond the erstwhile formal gardens, which were flanked on all sides by sturdy granite walls and wide slate steps there  was a breathtaking thirty-by-fifty-foot swimming pool.  Seven of eight steps running the entire width of the pool brought you neck-deep in the water.  The concrete pool was chipped and the surrounding patio slates in a state of upheaval.  But the setting was superb.  At one end of the pool, an impressive gray rock wall towered; at the other end two low-hanging pink dogwoods trees bowed their heads.  Then a precipitous drop-off prompted you to look beyond.  And there was the view!

Dogwood trees and fat bushes stumbled their way down the hill interlaced by horse trails and ending abruptly in the sparkling Crum Creek.  One of the few “clean” creeks left. Crum Creek boasted some fat and lively brook trout.

Across the valley dotting the opposite hillside sprawled the homes of suburbia-two fireplace, two cars, two dogs and one horse!

We knocked at the big front door.  I reached out to stroke the brass swan’s neck doorknobs.  Just standing there I felt a bit elegant. When the door swung open, Andy turned on his Irish charm.   Within minutes, we were on the other side of the door.  

A breathtaking crystal chandelier, at least five feet in diameter, hung in the circle of the gently ascending stairway.  I could not tear my eyes away.

When I did, I spotted my open mouth in the full-length mirror monopolizing one complete wall.

“Carried over from, France,” I heard someone murmur.

As we walked from room to room on cushiony Oriental rugs of every hue and design, it was apparent that changes were taking place.  The furniture had been shoved into one corner of the ballroom; mattresses and bed springs made a unique playhouse, wheelchairs served as
automobiles,” and the forty-six foot paint-peeled ballroom was their drag strip.

Yet, underneath this outer crust was the unmistakable charm of a handsome mansion.

And it was tailored to fit our needs.  An elevator, two fire escapes, emergency lighting and exit sign, handrails in the wide halls, and even a  commercial stove in the in the kitchen.  And each bedroom boasted a bathroom of its own.

We felt the hot fever of excitement burning again.  

Dear God, let it be the right one this time, please.  We’ve waited so long.

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Our board of directors traipsed through it with us the following week.  They were unanimous in their approval.  It would require much “spit and polish,” but it was a good solid home built on seven inches of concrete under the first floor alone.

The basement was a huge cavern with sturdy pillars of bricks and all kinds of mysterious wine cellars.  We were thoroughly intrigued by all the possibilities. 

Then the nerve-tingling business of trying to make an offer of purchase that would be acceptable to the owner.  Ten years earlier $128,000 had been the purchase price of the mansion and fifty acres of surrounding countryside.  but maybe, just maybe, she’d be sympathetic to our cause.  

Andy called that night to say that we had an appointment the net day with the owner at her nursing home in the city.  She was interested!

The woman, a raven-haired, self-assured woman, smiled at us briskly.  The kind of smile that has a definite beginning and a definite ending.  Her dark eyes had little part of this friendliness.  Amenities were quickly dispensed with.  Andy was at his best, trying so very hard for us.

But it was cold, hard business all the way.  For the first few minutes, she seemed to address all her conversation to me.  I deferred comment.  Soon she changed her conservational direction. 

The clipped voice went on about the marvelous location and adaptability of the “Chateau.”  She said that she had already passed up an offer of $300,000 for it.  I gulped and looked at my shoes.  Andy and Paul talked on.

God, I prayed, You softened Pharaoh’s heart and got your people out of Egypt.  Can you melt her heart, please and get us into that chateau?

We might as well have been planning a haven for emotionally disturbed angora cats, judging by the little interest she displayed in our project.

We left, with nothing apparently gained except the fact that she really loved that chateau and wasn’t at this moment absolutely sure that she wanted to sell it.  And I could hardly blame her.

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At our next board meeting, we voted to have an official appraisal made of the pink chateau.  It would cost us $300 and this would be one of our fist big expense items.  

Our cash position was not impressive.  With the first batch of dollars that had been raised and, counting on the promise of the $10,000 when we signed the purchase agreement we might be able to squeeze together $25,000

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Suddenly it was the month of Christmas again.  There had been such a dryness, such an appalling lack of forward Melmark motion that we were almost “doorknob shy.”  All the “open doors” had slammed in our faces, and now we were almost afraid to reach out to turn any shiny new knobs that popped into view.  We might  be left holding in the whole door in our hands.

But the day before Christmas dawned, and things did a right-about-face.  Paul and Bob had driven to the Berwyn post office to check our Melmark Box No. 146.  There just might be some further replies to our appeal letter--people bursting with Christmas spirit---maybe!

There were two letters!

“Read it, read it!”  They begged as they burst into the kitchen and handed me the first long white envelope.  Then, they turned away so I would not be blinded by the light in their eyes.

One contained a check for $2000 from a foundation in Nebraska.  I jumped up and yelled--this was our biggest check yet.

“The other one_ read the other one!” they coaxed, faces wreathed in huge grins.  In it was a personal check from a woman in Delaware for $25,000.  I laughed ---I cried---I ran through the house like a banshee.  Melissa took one look at me and covered up her eyes, howling loud and long.

Bob swooped her up in his big arms and trailed after me drunkenly.  Then we all fell to our knees around the big double bed and prayed together. Our voices were soggy with happy tears and the words indistinct.  but I kind of think God understood every single word.  

Now, at long last, we could afford to put a reasonable down payment on some of these places we were looking at.  It amazes me now, as I look back that we had the audacity---or was it faith?---to house hunt with as little cash in our jeans as we had!  The next few days saw increased giving and by the end of the year our asset were $55,000.  What a miracle!  It was unbelievable!

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Jan, the young mother who had typed our eighty letters to foundations, now performed a simple and loving act of faith.  The day after Christmas she brought us our very first student, her own mongoloid baby son, Todd.  this act of complete trust in us was of inestimable value right at this time of beginnings.  

‘’We borrowed a crib, moved Melissa over, and Melmark had begun!

Todd, twenty-two-months old, was a charming smile-b0x in the daytime but a yowler at night.  He sounded exactly like an angry little pussy cat on the back fence.  Melissa disliked him at first sight.  She covered her eyes and backed away from him.  He was to be avoided at all costs. 

Todd delighted in waking up at four in the morning. It was then that Paul and I would look at each other in our big double bed and wonder what in the world we were getting into.

We set up a playpen in the farthest corner of the dining room which, incidentally, was the farthest distance from us.  Then at his first cry, instead of waiting until the whole household was awake and crabby, I picked him up, changed his diaper, and groggily plopped him in his playpen where he played happily but noisily until we got up. It took some doing for me to adjust to two babies at age forty-four.  I felt more and more like Sarah every day.  

"The Pink Chateau"......better known as Melmark