Smiling, she says, "Relax, Mona," and her eyes go up and down me. "Brown sport coat," she says, "brown slacks, white shirt." She frowns and winces, "And a blue tie."

The woman tells the phone, "Middle-aged. Five-ten, maybe one hundred seventy pounds. Caucasian. Brown, green." She winks at me and says, "His hair's a little messy and he didn't shave today, but he looks harmless enough."

She leans forward a little and mouths, My secretary.

Into the phone, she says, "What?"

She steps aside and waves me in the door with her free hand. She rolls her eyes until they come around to meet mine and says, "Thank you for your concern, Mona, but I don't think Mr. Streator is here to rape me."

Where we're at is the Gartoller Estate on Walker Ridge Drive, a Georgian-style eightbedroom house with seven bathrooms, four fireplaces, a breakfast room, a formal dining room, and a fifteen-hundred-square-foot ballroom on the fourth floor. It has a separate six-car garage and a guesthouse. It has an in-ground swimming pool and a fire and intruder alarm system.

Walker Ridge Drive is the kind of neighborhood where they pick up the garbage five days a week. These are the kind of people who appreciate the threat of a good lawsuit, and when you stop by to introduce yourself, they smile and agree.

The Gartoller Estate is beautiful.

These neighbors won't ask you to come inside. They'll stand in their half-open front doors and smile. They'll tell you they really don't know anything about the history of the Gartoller house. It's a house.

If you ask any more, people will glance over your shoulder at the empty street. Then they'll smile again and say, "I can't help you. You really need to call the Realtor."