Is This Arnold's Mistress's House?

A once-quiet Baskersfield neighborhood was disrupted yesterday when the media learned that former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was the father of his former household staff member's 13-year-old son—who might live in one of the neighborhood's homes. TV satellite trucks gridlocked the block where Mildred Patricia Baena and her family moved a year ago, and neighbors sat stunned in their homes. Some worried about the affect the news would have on the polite 13-year-old boy who they say often walked a white poodle named Sugar through the neighborhood when he wasn't swimming in his backyard pool or playing basketball.

While the boy was a fixture in the neighborhood, residents say, they rarely saw his mother until she retired earlier this year. Until then, she had been working for Schwarzenegger's family and had kept an apartment near their LA home, 100 miles away, according to a neighbor. As for the Bakersfield home, the real estate agent responsible for selling it says she was told it was being purchased for an employee of Schwarzenegger's and that he was helping with the down payment. Property records show Baena took a loan of $219,224 to buy the $268,000 house. (And the plot thickens: Schwarzenegger had two sons born the same week.)