Part 29

[A second Thanksgiving dinner last night made me sleep kind of a lot. End of the month, numbering system no longer matters. 3k words in one day woooo!]

        The next portrait was another one of the couple, looking maybe a little older. Actually... the man didn't look any different, but the girl looked a little more grown-up, her expression was a little quieter, a little more demure. She was in a gorgeous white wedding dress, of a deceptively simple design. It hung in a long white pillar over her body, but was wrapped in thin swirls of lace and some translucent material, strands of tiny beads and things that sparkled, dangling strings of pearls hanging in loose loops all around. It gave a subtly detailed appearance, since everything was white and didn't draw attention to itself, until the light caught it at just the right angle. Her hair was mostly swept up, but a few tendrils had been delicately curled to hang down beside her face and against her neck. An intricate tiara rested in her hair, sparkling a million tiny stars, which fell among the rest of her hair as well - I couldn't tell quite what was scattered in her hair, whether it was small flowers, or gemstones, or some mixture of the two. One gloved hand rested on one of her husband's, he holding it gently, as if it were something easily bruised. Though she looked ahead at the camera, smiling with a combination of sheer rapture and shyness at the intensity of her emotion, he smiled tenderly down at her, his eyes not meeting the camera. He was dressed again in a dark suit, though his hair seemed a bit longer this time, and there were more details to his suit - some sort of intricate trim, embroidery maybe, that I couldn't quite make out. A spray of flowers fell in an unusually long cascade from his front breast pocket, with flowers to match the huge bouquet the bride held in her other hand. There was a trellis over their heads, dripping with flowers; judging by the light, it looked like the photo had been taken outside somewhere.
        The other four portraits were of the same smaller, paler size that the floral studies had been, and were matted into a single frame together. There was a photo of the two of them, standing in a garden at a bit of a distance, under the drooping blossoms of a magnolia tree, holding hands and looking lovingly at each other. There was one of the girl, her loose curls arranged prettily around her face, looking shyly down and away. One hand was cupped around the side of her face, and two stunning rings were on her ring finger, designed to fit together, I assumed they were engagement and wedding rings. Only one diamond was large (and it was huge), but the rest were arranged in such intricate patterns around the ring that it looked altogether more impressive than more large stones would have. The other two photos were of the man, more candid shots than the others of the two of them. One caught him smiling gently, his eyes warm and almost shy as they looked into the camera, so dark and rich and deep, his features softened far more than I would have thought possible, so gentle and--- And I suddenly realized my lungs were empty and I needed to breathe, I hadn't in a few minutes. His gaze was... entrancing. Addictive... oh hell, seductive was really the word for it. I shook my head and brought my eyes back into focus... but the clarity didn't last long, because the last photo was one of him asleep. All the sternness and imposing attitude were gone, the tenseness of his features smoothed away, looking so vulnerable and young and... and beautiful. I had seen him as handsome before, but here... he really was beautiful, even more so than the girl was. And yet... somehow sad and far away, there was still some strange mystery to him that couldn't escape even in sleep, where the girl had been open and readable in even the shots where she looked shy. So I could see what had drawn them to each other...
        But what was the sad story here? There had to be one, there was a sorrow in the house, which coated the love that had spilled into it just as the dust covered the fine wood and marble and gilding.
        I wasn't sure how well it would read, to take photos of the photos, but I took a few with my digital camera anyway, just for my self to look at and study later if I felt the need. I lifted the frames carefully to see if there was any notation on the back of a year or names or anything... but no luck. There was a small imprint in the bottom of one of the metallic-shadow prints of the photographer's studio - maybe that would be a bit of a lead to look up at the town museum.
        I took a last glance around the room, but didn't see anything more of interest, so I walked slowly down the stairs, retracing my steps all the way back down to the front entryway. I dug out my cell phone and checked the time. It was getting late in the afternoon, but I still had several hours of daylight left. I wanted to make sure I had at least an hour, preferably two, before sunset when I left, just in case I had issues finding my way back out of the woods. It felt like I'd been in the villa for an age... I could feel the weight of all the years the house held on my shoulders, like fallen dust. (In really high gravity?) I felt half transparent myself, a visitor into another time, looking at all these things my touch could not alter...
        ...I shook my head, forcing a quiet laugh. Of course I could alter it, every touch moved the dust out of the way, left fingerprints, made changes to the scenery. I could clip the vines away from the windows, I could let the sunlight touch the golden floors again.
        ...but though I told myself this, I still knew, somehow, that I wouldn't really be changing it. The history of this house had already been settled, whatever I did now was only archaeological work, it wasn't altering the lives of those who had lived in this place and made it their own.

        I decided to make a brief tour of the right wing of the house, maybe just looking into each room, and then I'd head back for the day. I started fresh at the front door again, and this time went to the right, into the parlor. It was every bit as decorous and untouchable as parlors always were in old books - corner tables with carefully-planned arrangements of delicate sculptures and dried floral arrangements, intricate lace doilies, a complex carpet of many subtle colors, straight-backed chairs and sofas with rich (but uncomfortable) looking fabrics, elaborate wallpaper, a small chandelier, imposing heavy drapes on the windows... it felt like a museum's recreation of some king's bedroom, like there should be velvet ropes barring me from sitting on anything, little signs here and there forbidding me to touch anything.
        I took a few pictures, but not many, and they felt awfully lifeless to me - just as museum shots would do. Things were said in here, people sat here, but life wasn't lived in here. I took the other exit out of the room, and found myself in a hallway that stretched down the length of the wing, similar to what I'd found in the kitchen wing. Across from the parlor was a vast library, walls covered from floor to ceiling with shelves filled with volumes of all sizes, colors, ages... It was exactly the sort of thing I'd always imagined when I'd thought of a house having a library. Very cozy, too, despite its size. The carpet was very deep and plush, a warm red covering the whole floor. There were deep window seats, some very inviting looking chairs and small sofas, and pillows absolutely everywhere. The colors of the furniture were mostly deep browns and reds, with bits of white and black here and there. It made for a nice backdrop to the books, really showing off the colors of the bindings. I took a few pictures here, but didn't want to take too much time - I had no idea just how many rooms there were, and I didn't want to spend more than two hours in this half of the villa.
        Beside the library was a small room, filled with art supplies. There were a few easels, and large trays filled with all sorts of paints and brushes, counters covered in palettes and canvas and unusually pretty little pots, presumably for water. One counter had a high stool pulled up to it, and there were rows of pencils laid out, a small wooden box of colored pencils left half-open. It wasn't exactly messy, nor was it cluttered - everything was laid out neatly, there was just every conceivable artistic necessity, so an inventory of any kind would feel pretty long. Bits of charcoal and... chalk? No, pastels. I was a little weak on the drawing-based arts, I was awful at them so I avoided them whenever possible, but technically being an art major, I was subjected to more of it than I liked, but it was just enough to appreciate here just how rich a supply this person had. I wondered if it was the man or woman's studio? I stepped up to the easels, and saw delicate floral studies, in various stages of completion. The line work was very light and tentative, the colors seemed to be added very carefully. It had a very feminine feel to it... but somehow I couldn't really be sure whose it was. Something in that man's face... there was more to him than one might first guess. Still, the woman's dresses had shown what an eye for beauty and detail she had. The light wasn't quite right for taking shots in here now, but I took a few of the supplies lined neatly on the wooden counter tops, the piles of dried paint on the palettes, close-ups of a partially-finished painting. I looked on each painting in the room, but there were no signatures - I didn't see any finished ones in the room at all.
        The room beside this was a bathroom. I was a little surprised to see it, I hadn't been sure about indoor plumbing in a place this old, but there again... the owners had been incredibly wealthy. There was a bathtub, and an odd mix of wood and porcelain that I took to an early version of a toilet. (No way was I going to poke at it to find out though - I'd had a few run-ins with outhouses, and the disgusting pits you could glimpse through the hole that passed for a toilet, and no way in hell was I going to risk looking down another. So gross.) The bathtub was large, white, with brass fixtures and, of course, clawed feet holding it a little ways above the marble-tiled floor. There was no sink, but a prettily carved wooden stand with a painted china basin set into it. A large pitcher, painted to match, sat inside the basin. A few shaped soaps rested in china dishes alongside the basin, and an oval mirror hung above it. There was a small cabinet hung on the wall nearby, and a peek inside revealed all sorts of small bottles whose actual contents I didn't even want to guess at. (Though I did take a few pictures - as long as I didn't disturb the seals on anything, my internal organs should be safe.)
        At the end of the hall was a stairway, leading to the next floor, but I turned instead to investigate the rest of this level. The next room, nearest the stairs but against the front of the house, looked like a guest room, though a small one, decorated in a light, cheerful style. There were floral prints and soft yellow walls, a surprising contrast to the decor in the rest of the house, like a sudden burst of sunlight into a dim museum. Yet it almost made it more sad, to see the signs of abandonment here, the layers of dust dimming the sunny yellow curtains, age forced on to such a youthful place. There were a few dolls on top of a wooden bureau, in elaborate ruffled dresses and large feathered hats. ...had there been a child in the house? No, if they had had a daughter, there would have been photos alongside the others in the tower room, there would have been photos everywhere. And there couldn't have been so many fragile things so near the ground as there were... I realized there were still quite a few luxurious touches to the room - the sheets on the bed looked to be satin or silk, though the shine had dulled with age. There were some paintings on the wall, not much larger than a normal sheet of paper, that looked like fairy tale illustrations, though none were immediately recognizable to me. The furniture was as finely made as any other I'd seen in the house, and there was no sign of a child's mess of toys or anything.
        The next room looked like a glorified coatroom. One wall was covered in a long row of brass hooks, a few placed in a second row above the first but at a shorter distance - for hats, I guessed. There was a long, low shelf of ironwork near the floor that I figured was for boots or something, though I couldn't imagine anyone being so undignified around here as to walk barefoot. Maybe they'd had those rubber over-shoe things, like my grandpa sometimes wore over his dress shoes in the winter. There were still a few coats hanging, down at the far end by a small window. Two were fur, and I was sure they were real fur, which was a little creepy, I was a bit hesitant to touch them. But they were incredibly soft - one was a warm reddish-brown, the other white.
        There were also a pair of high-topped boots, with at least a dozen impossibly tiny buttons running up the side. I couldn't even imagine trying to get those on in a hurry, shoe laces were difficult enough early in the morning. On the opposite side of the room (hardly more than a bit of wide hallway, really, maybe six feet across) were several full-length mirrors, frescoes between them of some abstract pattern, sort of floral but it was hard to be sure. Very geometric compositions, but with fluid lines and intricate patterning... art deco, I decided, and now that I thought of it an awful lot of the decor in the house would fit into that genre. I took a few shots of the frescoes, since the light was falling nicely against them, then stepped back into the hall. The parlor took up the rest of this floor it seemed, so I went back toward the stairway.
        The railing was highly polished, the wood burnished smooth by much use as much as varnish, I decided. The stairs themselves had a thin carpet running up the middle, covering most of the golden wood that matched the floors. They didn't creak half as much as I'd expected them to. A few paintings hung on the walls, of exotic garden scenes and elegant bits of architecture, languid women lounging about in gauzy dresses. Sconces were placed on the wall in a few places, and I realized I had seen several of the same type throughout the rooms I'd been in. Now that I was looking at them closer, I decided they much have been gas lamps of some sort. There was a glass enclosure at the top of a curved bit of metal that probably contained a pipe, but no light bulb or anything inside it. God that felt so unsafe to me, having so much open flame all around!
        At the top of the stairs, a short hallway doubled back to meet up with the main hallway, which again ran the length of the floor, though this seemed to end in only a wall. The only access to the tower room on the third floor seemed to be from the outdoor balcony... which seemed a little strange to me, but I supposed it wasn't really needed for anything, just a nice place to sit and do quiet things away from the rest of the house. The walls here were papered from the ceiling down to about waist-height, where a border of carved dark wood trim ran along from door to door, branching at the doorways to frame each one. There was a similar border against the floor, which was the gold wood seen everywhere else, and against the ceiling, which, I was thrilled to see, had another fresco, similar to the one in the ballroom in style, though this was one much less elaborate, and more peaceful. It was largely a garden, but a more open one, in line with the paintings on the stairway, with quiet bodies of water and soft hills, small cherubs like butterflies hanging in the air, children dancing in circles and young couples lounging under blossoming trees.

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lab.drwicked.com

^ That site is AMAZING, I wish I'd known about it in past years. I have a major problem with getting sidetracked (hi! I'm posting on my blog instead of chipping away at my word count!), and that site won't let you do it. It's like NaNoWriMo in ultra-condensed form. And with more threats!

...which I will need. I have twenty-four and a half hours to get another... five thousand or so words. And then I will win. \0/ I WILL DO IT! I have tomorrow off from work. And I have more caffeine in the house if I need it tonight.