by Lucas Malet
III
Finding it unlikely that his uncle would ask for him before evening, andthat consequently he had plenty of time at his disposal, Laurenceembarked after breakfast upon a survey of the house. When a boy atschool he had occasionally passed a couple of nights at Stoke Rivers.His recollections of these visits were not gay. He had been glad enoughto go away again. It followed that his impressions of the house itselfwere vague and confused. He now found that it was constructed in theshape of a capital L reversed. The base of the letter, facing east andwest, contained kitchens, offices, and servants' quarters. The mainbuilding--at right angles to it--was two stories in height, andconsisted of suites of handsome rooms opening on to a wide corridor. Thewindows of the latter looked south, those of the rooms north. Thecolouring and furnishings resembled, in the main, those of Mr. Rivers'bedroom. Dark panelled walls, rich, sombre hangings of dark blue,crimson, or violet obtained throughout. In the drawing-rooms were somenoble landscapes by Cuyp, Ruysdael, and other Dutch masters of note.There was also an admirable collection of Italian ivories, small figuresof exquisite workmanship; and several glass cases containing fineantique and renaissance gems. The walls of the libraries were lined withbooks--a curious and varied collection, ranging from ancientblack-letter volumes down to the latest German treatise, on naturalscience or metaphysics, of the current year. Laurence promised himselfto make nearer acquaintance with these rather weighty joys at a moreconvenient season. Meanwhile, in contrast to the otherwise distinctlyold-fashioned character of the house, he remarked a very completeinstallation of electric light, and an ingenious system of hot-airventilation, by means of which a temperature of over seventy degrees wasmaintained throughout the whole interior. This produced a heavy andenervating atmosphere of which Laurence--fresh from the strong clean airof the Atlantic--became increasingly and disagreeably sensible. It madehim at once restless and inert; and as he wandered, rather aimlesslyfrom room to room, he was annoyed by finding a slight nervousness gainedon him--he, whose nerves were usually of the steadiest, happilyconspicuous by their absence, indeed, rather than by their presence!
"Upon my word, this beats the American abomination of steam heat," hesaid to himself.
His visit to the library, where the smell of old leather bindings addedto the deadness of the air, nearly finished him. He went out on to thecorridor, and paced the length of it, past the flying staircase of blackoak leading to the upper corridor, and back again. A broad strip ofdeep-pile, crimson carpet was spread along the centre of the polishedfloor. On one hand, between the doors of the living-rooms, hung acollection of valuable copper-plate engravings, representing classicruins in Italy and Greece. While on the other, in the spaces between thewindows, were ranged a series of busts--Augustus, Tiberias, Nero, thetwo Antonines, Caligula, and Commodus--set on tall columnar pedestals ofdark green or yellow marble. The blind, sculptured faces deepened thegeneral sense of oppression by their rigidity, their unalterable andsomewhat scornful repose.
Out of doors the March morning was tumultuous with wind and wet,offering marked contrast to the dry heat, the almost burdensome orderand stillness reigning within. The air of the corridor was perhaps adegree fresher than that of the library he had just quitted. Laurenceleaned his arms on a stone window-sill, and glanced in a desultory wayat the day's _Times_, which he had picked up off the hall table inpassing. But Chinese railway concessions, plague reports from Bombay,even the last racing fixtures, or rumours of fighting on the North-WestIndian Frontier, failed to arouse his interest. In his present humour,these items of news from the outside world seemed curiously unimportantand remote. He stared at the wide, well-wooded, rain-blurred landscape.The scene at which he had assisted last night, the intimate drama movingforward relentlessly even now to its close in that well-appointed roomupstairs--and the extraordinary character of the chief actor in thatdrama--his over-stimulated brain and atrophied affections, his greed ofexperiment and of acquiring information, even yet, in the very articleof death--depressed Laurence's imagination as the close atmospheredepressed his body. It was all so painfully narrow, barren, hungry,joyless, somehow. And meanwhile, he, Laurence, was required to play thefool--not for the provocation of laughter, which would after all havehad a semblance of cheerful good-fellowship in it. But in cold blood, asan object lesson in the manner and customs of the average man; a lessonthe result of which would be tabulated and pigeon-holed by thatunwearying intelligence, as might be the habits of some species ofobscure, unpleasant insect. The young man had developed slightintolerance of the exclusively worldly side of things lately. It seemedby no means improbable he might develop equal intolerance of theexclusively intellectual side before long, at this rate.
"I seem qualifying as a past-master in the highly unprofitable act ofquarrelling with my bread and butter," he said to himself. "If I chucksociety, and proceed to chuck brains as well, for a man like myself,without genius and without a profession, what the devil is there left?"
Meditating thus, he had left his station at the window, and walked tothe extreme end of the corridor farthest away from the servants' wing ofthe house. It was closed by a splendid tapestry curtain, whereon a crowdof round-limbed cupids drove a naked and reluctant woman, with gesturesof naughty haste, towards a satyr, seated beneath a shadowy grove oftrees upon a little monticule, who beckoned with one hand while with theother he stopped the notes of his reed pipe. The tapestry was of greatbeauty and indubitable worth; but the subject of it was slightlydispleasing to Laurence, a trifle gross in suggestion, as had been thesphinxes and caryatides of the carven ebony bed.
"Oh! of course there's that sort of thing left," he said to himself,recurring to his recent train of thought. "But, no thank you, I flattermyself I can hardly find satisfaction in those low latitudes atpresent."
Having, however, an appreciation of all fine artistic work, he laid holdof the border of the curtain, wishing to feel its texture. To hissurprise, it was of very great weight, padded and lined with leather, asare curtains covering the doors of certain Roman churches.
Laurence pulled the corner of it towards him and passed behind it. Thecurtain fell back into position with a muffled thud, leaving himstanding in a narrow, dark, cupboard-like space, closed by a door, ofwhich it took him some stifling seconds to find the handle. He fumbledblindly in the dark, an almost childish sense of agitation upon him. Hefelt as in dreams, when the place to be traversed grows more and morecontracted, walls closing down and in on every hand, while the means ofexit become more maddeningly impossible of discovery. To his surprise,he turned faint and broke into a sweat. It was not in the least anamusing experience.
At last the handle gave, with a click, and the door opened, disclosing alarge and lofty room quite unlike any one which he had yet visited. Itwas delicately fresh both in atmosphere and colouring. It wore agracious and friendly look, seeming to welcome the intruder with ademure gladsomeness. A certain gaiety pervaded it even on thisunpropitious morning. The great bay-window, facing east, gave upon astately Italian garden, beyond the tall cypresses, white statues, andfountains of which spread flat, high-lying lawns of brilliantly greenturf. These were crossed by a broad walk of golden gravel leading to anavenue of enormous lime-trees, the domed heads of which were justtouched with the rose-pink buds of the opening spring.
The furniture of the room was of satin-wood, highly polished and paintedwith garlands of roses, true-lovers' knots of blue ribbon, daintylandscapes, ladies and lovers, after the manner of Boucher. The chairsand sofas were upholstered in brocade, the predominating colours ofwhich were white, pale yellow, and pale pink. An old-fashioned, square,semi-grand piano--the case of it in satin-wood and painted like therest--stood out into the room. On a spindle-legged table beside it lay aquantity of music, the printing very black, the pages brown with age.Close against these was a violin case covered with faded, red velvet,on which were stamped initials and a crest.
Laurence's eyes dwelt on these things. And then--surely there should bea harp in the further left-hand c
orner, the strings of it covered by agilded, stamped leather hood? Yes, it was there right enough.--And atall escritoire, with a miniature brass balustrade running along the topof it, should stand at right angles to the chimney-piece, upon whichlast, doubled by the looking-glass behind, should be tall azure and gold_Sevres_ jars, an Empire clock--the golden face of it set in a ring ofprecious garnets--figures in Chelsea china and branched, goldcandlesticks.
Laurence looked for and found these objects, a prey at once to surpriseand to a sense of happy familiarity. He was perfectly acquainted withthis room--but why or how he knew not. He was filled, too, by a singularsense of expectation. It was to him as though some exquisite presencehad but lately quitted this apartment and might, at any instant, returnto it. He apprehended something tenderly, delectably feminine. The chinaornaments, and many little fanciful silver toys, spoke of a woman'staste. So did a tambour frame, and an ivory work-box, the lid of itopen, disclosing dainty property of gold thimble, scissors, cottons, andwhat not--and a half-finished frill of cobweb-like India muslin, alittle, gold-eyed needle sticking in the mimic hem. On the small tablebeside the work-box lay a white vellum-bound copy of the _Vita Nuova_ ofDante, and the _Introduction to the Devout Life_ of St. Francis deSales.
Perplexed by his own sensations, possessed too by a sudden, gentlereverence and longing which he could not explain, Laurence touched thepretty trifles in the work-box; fitted the thimble on the tip of hislittle finger; turned the pages of the Dante, and read how the poet camenear swooning at first sight of the maiden of eight years old whom,though she was never destined to be his mistress or wife, he loved everafter, and made immortal in immortal verse. He unlocked the wornred-velvet violin case and drew the bow--not for the first time--hecould have sworn not--across the wailing strings. What did it all mean?Yes, what, indeed,--in the name of common-sense, of New York andNewport, of his golf and polo, and cotillions, of crowded opera-houseand shouting racecourse? In the name, too, of those hard, brilliant,dying eyes, and that cold, hungry intellect upstairs, what did it mean?He had no recollection of having been into this room on his formervisits to Stoke Rivers in his boyhood. And yet, of course, he must havebeen here--otherwise? But then this overmastering sense of expectation,this apprehension of an exquisite feminine presence, this--
"Upon my word, I'm playing the fool to some purpose," he said, halfaloud.
He crossed the room, threw wide the French window and went onto the headof the semicircular flight of stone steps without. The wind buffeted himroughly. The rain spattered in his face. On the left, the lawns weredivided from the downward slope of rough park and woodland by a sunkfence. Beyond was outspread an extensive tract of rolling, woodedcountry--red and white hamlets half buried among trees, here and therethe spire of a village church, flat, green pastures lying along thevalleys, brown patches of hop-garden and ploughland, and upliftedagainst the grey, storm-drifted horizon a windmill crowning someconspicuous height. Suddenly the cry of hounds, running, salutedLaurence's ear. Then the whole pack, breaking covert, crossed the openpark. The field followed, horses pulling, riders leaning forward,squaring their shoulders to the wind--a flash of scarlet, chestnut,black and bay, behind the dappled joy of the racing pack.
For a moment the strange influences of this strange day made even themerry hunt appear to Laurence as the pageant of an uneasy dream. Butsoon the honest outdoor life claimed him again, forcing him back uponunquestioned realities. He closed the French window behind him, stood onthe wet steps spending some anxious moments in the lighting of a cigar,and then strolled, hatless, round to the stables to make inquiry as towhat his uncle might own in the matter of horseflesh.