Majordomo

“ Girolamo had organised a great ball to celebrate the completion of his Palace. He had started living in it as soon as there were walls and roof, but he had spent years on the decorations, taking into his service the best artists he could find in Italy; and now at last everything was finished. The Orsi had been invited with peculiar cordiality, and on the night we betook ourselves to the Palace.
We walked up the stately staircase, a masterpiece of architecture, and found ourselves in the enormous hall which Girolamo had designed especially for gorgeous functions. It was ablaze with light. ”

“ Open! Que es eso? (what is all this?) Major-domo! what is the reason of this?’ said I, for to my astonishment every hand was empty.
“‘I really don’t know, sir; they must have drawn the grains and swallowed [Pg 123] them, for not a single one remains in my hat!’ said the major-domo, turning his hat-mouth downwards to prove that nothing was there. ”

“ The platform and flight of steps before the columned entrance of the church is strikingly grand; and the dome, which lifts itself up so proudly above the pediment of the portico, merits praise for its lightness and elegance.
My eyes ranged along the vast extent of palace on each side till they were tired, and I was glad to turn them from the glare of marble and confusion of sculptured ornaments to the blue expanse of the distant ocean. Before the front of this colossal structure a wide level of space extends itself, at the extremity of which several white houses lie dispersed. ”

“ Dominey, who was first scrutinised by an individual in buff waistcoat and silk hat at the porter's lodge, was interviewed by a major-domo in the great stone hall, conducted through an extraordinarily Victorian drawing-room by another myrmidon in a buff waistcoat, and finally ushered into a tiny little boudoir leading out of a larger apartment and terminating in a conservatory filled with sweet-smelling exotics. The Duchess, who was reclining in an easy-chair, held out her hand, which her visitor raised to his lips. ”

“ Mr Dombey’s mansion, if it be a gap among the other houses any longer, is only so because it is not to be vied with in its brightness, and haughtily casts them off. The saying is, that home is home, be it never so homely. If it hold good in the opposite contingency, and home is home be it never so stately, what an altar to the Household Gods is raised up here! ”

“ For never till the last, till fortune was desperate and escape a vanished dream, was wont to come that marvelous Door that gaped open-mouthed. Ah! The Duke started violently, the blood rushing to his face and his heart beating quick. Here, at the end of the lane most remote from his own villa, at a small two-storied house bright with green paint and flowering creepers, here, in the most unlikely, most inevitable place, was the open door. ”

“ When out of the village street, I put (as the vulgar phrase expresses it) my best foot foremost, and enacted the part of a running serving-man in the track of my noble conductor; and finally I arrived, in such state as may be conceived, at the entrance-hall of the noble mansion. In the courtyard were numerous serving-men mounted in silent gravity, and ranged around the wall. Each man was wrapped up in a dark-coloured cloak ”

“ Outside, in the hall, there was the sound of a heavy step, and the next moment there appeared in the door a tall, heavily-built man of fifty, with iron-gray hair and keen, restless eyes, which always seemed on the alert to discover something hidden, and drag it to the light. ”

“ When, however, the multitude came in front of the large mansion or palace in which Giacomo resided, and which was tenanted entirely by students, the great majority of whom were his zealous partisans, and all of whom were prepared, in any quarrel whatever, to take part against the townsmen, they found the enterprise they had undertaken to be one of no little difficulty. ”

“ I was gazing airily into the muddy sky, when a roar issued from the door-way:
“Montez les hommes!” or “Send the men up!”
It was the beefy-necked. We filed from the cour, through the door, past a little window which I was told belonged to the kitchen, down the clammy corridor, up the three flights of stairs, to the door of The Enormous Room. Padlocks were unlocked, chains rattled, and the door thrown open. We entered. The Enormous Room received us in silence. The door was slammed and locked behind us by the planton, whom we could hear descending the gnarled and filthy stairs. ”

“ With this imperfect happiness to cheer him, he would shut the door softly, walk away on tiptoe, and leave his great chief to be stared at, through a dome-shaped window in the leads, by ugly chimney-pots and backs of houses, and especially by the bold window of a hair-cutting saloon on a first floor, where a waxen effigy, bald as a Mussulman in the morning, and covered, after eleven o'clock in the day, with luxuriant hair and whiskers in the latest Christian fashion, showed him the wrong side of its head for ever. ”

“ It was taken notice of by all the Lodgers that the Major moped. He hadn't even the same air of being rather tall than he used to have, and if he varnished his boots with a single gleam of interest it was as much as he did. One evening the Major came into my little room to take a cup of tea and a morsel of buttered toast and to read Jemmy's newest letter which had arrived that afternoon (by the very same postman more than middle-aged upon the Beat now) , and the letter raising him up a little I says to the Major: "Major you mustn't get into a moping way." ”

“ He had carefully locked the door of his room, and had little fear that the fastening could be forced; but, accidentally casting his eyes on the floor, he saw by the light of the moon which gleamed full upon the window of his room, and which, rendered more vivid by its contrast from the subsided storm, was pouring out its chastened radiance from a now cloudless sky, that a hand had been introduced between the boards of his chamber and the bottom of the door, and was seeking to lift it from its hinges. ”

“ The gate stood open; and whilst disengaging themselves from their dying horses, they spied a pale light proceeding from a door at the extreme end of a wide hall, whose dark side received not the faintest ray.
“Too sure are we,” said James, “in the fatal wood of which I spoke; nor shall we escape from its dreaded inclosure.”
“Let us, however,” exclaimed Edmund, “learn why we are brought hither; let us follow the light, which seems to direct, our steps across the gloomy hall.” ”

“ At that instant, the little side-door leading from the waste ground to the street was noiselessly opened, and a tall, powerful young man, dressed in a common gray blouse and velvet cap, but whose carefully arranged hair, beard and mustaches, all of the glossiest black, but ill accorded with his plebeian attire, after casting a rapid glance around him, in order to assure himself he was unobserved, entered by this door, and carefully closing it after him, proceeded with a hurried step toward the iron gate. ”

“ He lay back on his pillow staring before him, with his bristling hair more erect than ever, and his intensely dark and bright old eyes touched with the glitter of fever. His apartment was humble and scrupulously neat, and I could see that my dusky guide was a faithful servant. Captain Diamond, lying there rigid and pale on his white sheets, resembled some ruggedly carven figure on the lid of a Gothic tomb. He looked at me silently, and my companion withdrew and left us alone.
"Yes, it's you," he said, at last, "it's you, that good young man. There is no mistake, is there?" ”

“ A little to one side was a heavy door, with a double row of faience set over its square top and descending on beautiful onyx pillars. An octagonal dome, tipped with a shaft of three golden balls, completed the building above. It was a pretty exterior with a touch of art in the line of windows, and as I passed into the interior by the lovely onyx columns it seemed like a reminiscence, almost a renaissance, to find before my gaze the familiar blue and green tiles, plaques of wrought plaster in arabesque, pretty bits of faience adornment—forms of the ornament and color so delightful to me. ”

“ The noise brought them instantly to a halt, and each man grasped his arms in expectation of an attack, but the peal ceasing in a few moments, and all continuing quiet, they moved on as before, and presently reached a large hall with a lofty window over the door, which, being without shutters, afforded light enough to reveal the dilapidated condition of the mansion. ”

“ Over the way, opposite to the staring blank bow windows of the Dodo, are a little ironmonger’s shop, a little tailor’s shop (with a picture of the Fashions in the small window and a bandy-legged baby on the pavement staring at it) —a watchmakers shop, where all the clocks and watches must be stopped, I am sure, for they could never have the courage to go, with the town in general, and the Dodo in particular, looking at them. ”

“ One of the few outstanding features of the place is the huge dome which towers above all the other buildings, but the visitor is disappointed when, on closer inspection, he discovers that it is neither old nor new, but merely a monument to the childish and unstable zeal of the tyrant Lopez, who, with a feverish energy, undertook many ambitious building schemes, which, through lack of means or waning enthusiasm, he never completed. ”

“ He answered that the master was away from home, but that he thought it probable the housekeeper would consent to do the honours. I passed my arm into Searle's. "Come," I said; "drain the cup, bitter-sweet though it be. We must go in." We hastened slowly and approached the fine front. The house was one of the happiest fruits of its freshly-feeling era, a multitudinous cluster of fair gables and intricate chimneys, brave projections and quiet recesses, brown old surfaces weathered to silver and mottled roofs that testified not to seasons but to centuries. ”

“ It never struck the colonel that his own society was not what tied Sir Clement to Dome Castle; for widowers with grown-up daughters are in a foreign land without interpreters. On that morning when the baronet vanished, nevertheless, the master of Dome Castle was the only person in it who did not think that it would soon lose its mistress, mere girl though she was. ”

“ III.—THE AMENITIES OF THE HIGH STREET Every here and there between the shops in the High Street is a house that has survived the request—it never amounts to a demand in Mallingham—for “business premises.” Quite unpretentious is the appearance of all these houses, but the front door opens upon a hall that is a hall, and not a mere passage to a narrow staircase. Admirably proportioned rooms are to be found on every floor, and usually a door at the farther end of the hall admits one to a garden, and not a mere patch of green. ”

“ The king is nobody in his own palace; but the man perhaps may prove to be worth something. Well, we shall see to-morrow morning. Oh! oh!" cried he, all at once starting up, "that is a gigantic idea, mordioux! and perhaps my fortune depends, at least, upon that idea!" After this exclamation, the officer arose and marched, with his hands in the pockets of his justaucorps, about the immense ante-chamber that served him as an apartment. ”

“ After a few moments he took another step forward and, with the postern gate still open, stood gazing thoughtfully and watchfully over the medley of red-tiled roofs, up the great avenue beyond, to where the imposing front of the Hall, with its long rows of uncurtained windows, filled the background with a serene and brooding dignity. ”

“ Even the First Room, which is exclusively English, is not so attractive as it has sometimes been; though here and there a late Turner or an early Cotman, a Hogarth ‘conversation piece,’ vivacious and sterling, or a William Dobson portrait, honest at least and capable, asserts unmistakably the hand of a master. ”

“ Q. Why is respect paid to the triangle? A. Because it contains the name of the Grand Architect of the universe. Most Perfect knocks nine, and brethren all rise. Most Perfect says, "Brother Senior Warden, give notice that I am going to open a Lodge of Perfect Grand Elect and Sublime Masons, by the mysterious number 3, 5, 7 and 9. Senior Warden obeys. Signs of former degrees given, then the Most Perfect knocks three, and all the brethren give the first sign of this degree. Most Perfect knocks three, and then third sign. ”

“ Here he lived all the year round, save when he took a trip to the Continent, and, as the Bristol was always full of people, the Major did not lack company. As he was a good-humoured little man, with plenty of small talk and a fund of out-of-the-way information, he soon became immensely popular. In this way the crafty Major had all the comforts of home and the delights of society without bearing the burden of an establishment of his own. ”

“ For him the temple is nearing completion, the last stones are being placed, and he slakes his lime with a vague regret as he sees dome and minaret rise through the power of his handiwork. The true Master does not long for rest, and as he sees the days of his labor close, a sadness weighs upon his heart. Slowly the brothers of his Craft leave him, each going his respective way; and, climbing step by step, the Master stands alone on the pinnacle of the temple. ”

“ It is besides said, that a market is occasionally held here for the aerial inhabitants.
But although the adventurous stranger is now on the roof, he has still a great hight to ascend before he reaches the summit of the dome. Previously to his engaging in this enterprise, he is conducted to the inside gallery of the dome. From this spot the people within the body of the church appear 645like children. The higher he goes, the more uncomfortable he finds himself, on account of the oblique walls over the narrow staircase; and he is often compelled to lean with his whole body quite to one side. ”