LeRoy Worley keeps his eye on the building and guards its secrets.

Most of them, anyway.

Worley admits the Shenandoah Building's two elevators don't always work on the same day but suggests with a wink and grin to a visiting journalist that he reports they fail to function only "occasionally." Moments later, building owner Dr. David Trinkle arrives at Worley's seventh-floor office and tells him one of the elevators is out of service.

"Oh," responds Worley, who then laughs as mischievously as a child caught with a pilfered cookie before emphasizing that a contract has been signed to replace the Otis lifts. He says they are the "oldest working elevators in Roanoke."

Worley, an associate broker and property manager for Francis Realtors, doesn't literally wink when he talks about late-night card games once played in the Shenandoah Building's "penthouse," a nondescript roof apartment now used for storage. But his words do. Prominent Roanoke businessmen once gathered there after the nearby Shenandoah Club closed to drink and gamble, he said. The penthouse might have hosted other activities, but Worley isn't talking.

For Worley, the Shenandoah Building seems to be nearly a living thing. He clearly feels affection for the seven-story building at the corner of First Street and Kirk Avenue downtown. And for its history and long-term tenants. He is proud the circa-1910 building - which is a brick and mortar, copper-corniced microcosm of Roanoke business history - is now fully leased.

"We are extremely fortunate," he said, noting that Virginia Business magazine's 2004 Roanoke/New River Statistical Digest reported a vacancy rate of more than 30 percent for similar, class-B office space downtown.

An interest in the Shenandoah Building has been owned by someone in the marriage-linked Trinkle and Francis families for decades. But psychiatrist David Trinkle acknowledges Worley knows more than he does about the building and probably even about Trinkle family history.

Members of the Trinkle family have included: a Virginia governor, E. Lee Trinkle, who was David's grandfather and an officer of Shenandoah Life Insurance Co.; James "Jimmy" Trinkle, who was David's father and president of C.W. Francis & Son; and Betty Francis Trinkle Freeman, who was David's mother and a granddaughter of C.W. Francis, founder of C.W. Francis & Son.

Like Worley, Trinkle said he is thrilled the building is fully occupied with office or retail tenants large and small. Trinkle's Shenandoah Building Associates LLC has owned the building since February, when he bought out the shares of his brother Will, a longtime advocate for downtown.

"I'm a huge fan of downtown Roanoke and [downtown's] success is one of the main things going for Roanoke right now," he said.

Both Trinkle and Worley said the Shenandoah Building, with its several long-term tenants, has a personable, nearly familial feel.

Tenants interviewed said similar things.

"Everybody in the Shenandoah Building is like a little family," said Anne Edenfield, a lawyer who has had an office in the building since 1988.

"I love it here," she said. "I have a wonderful view of the mountains. It's close to the courthouse and I love being downtown. I can't imagine being anyplace else."

Onzlee Ware, a lawyer with Ware, Cargill & Hill and member of the Virginia House of Delegates, has been a tenant since 1992.

"I wouldn't leave here to lease another space," Ware said. "The only way I would ever leave would be if I was to buy a building."

With a smile, Ware added, "We know everybody in the halls. We speak whether we like each other or not."

Fellow Democrat Granger Macfarlane, president of Eastern Motor Inns and a former state senator, has had an office in the Shenandoah Building since 1966.

"The rent has always been very reasonable," Macfarlane said. "And you couldn't have a better location if you want to be in downtown Roanoke," citing proximity to the courthouse, to banks and city hall.

Macfarlane said he misses the late William "Willie" Wilkes, the building's maintenance man. He said he also misses the coffee gatherings downstairs at Guy's Restaurant, whose street-level space is occupied now by Swagat Indian Cuisine. But tenants get to know one another anyway, he said.

"Over time, you make friends who always seem to stay," he said. "I guess if you put all that in a pot and stir it around you get a good location to do business."

Landlord Trinkle would agree.

"It's a solid building with some tradition behind it," he said. "It's been well maintained. And we're very competitive on the square-foot rent."

Worley said the base rent averages about $10.50 per square foot.

The building rose as a three-story structure in 1910. Built by the Anchor Co., an anchor inlay remains in the original marble lobby. In the 1920s, four floors were added and Shenandoah Life Insurance Co. purchased the building.

Any office building with a history of housing human beings for nearly 100 years would accumulate stories both comic and tragic.

Worley apparently knows a host of these old stories. He dangles hints. He alludes. But, in the end, a property manager must be circumspect, at least publicly, and Worley realizes this restriction. Thus, the Shenandoah Building certainly has secrets only Worley knows.