The Yellow House by Tyrer D

Author:Tyrer, D. [Tyrer, D.]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Publisher: Dynatox Ministries International
Published: 2014-03-25T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER FIVE

We continued our explorations after that – I continued to be amazed at the number of floors the Yellow House contained. We hadn’t even reached the attic spaces yet.

Camilla began by taking me to the portrait gallery where members of our kindred and famous figures of history stared with serious expressions from within picture frames. Here were luminaries such as Caesar and Napoleon, men who had shaken the world. Here was our great uncle, Comte de Castaigne; there father’s cousin, Lord Atheling. In one corner, I even spotted my father, portrayed as a young man. Fascinating, yet somehow blending together into a morass of imagery that I couldn’t quite take in.

There was a vast chamber like a theatre with a stage and wings and chairs for an audience to sit and watch a play. It was a most unexpected discovery – I don’t recall ever hearing of a house, even a grand one such as this, being possessed of a dedicated theatre. Even in the houses of great lords obsessed with such diversions, they usually had to make do with temporary stages in the ballrooms, or visit the grand theatres in the city.

“I believe our grandfather had it built,” Camilla told me in response to my questioning her about the odd room. “He used it to stage but a single performance and, since then, it has sat unused and unloved.”

“I love it,” I told her; which was true, even if the sepulchral silence of the chamber intimidated me.

“Ah, yes, but to love something is not to use it.”

“Well, perhaps someday we shall stage our own performance here.”

“Shall we rehearse it now? Will you play the beautiful princess and I your dashing beau?” She swept me in her arms, tilted my head back and pressed her lips against mine in the manner of a pair of lovers in a melodrama. I must admit that her action shocked and surprised me a little, especially the fervour of her kiss, but it was not entirely unpleasant and I was more surprised that I returned it. I laughed, as much to cover my embarrassment, when she released me.

“There, a fine performance. Would you have thought it, Sylvia: you and I, kissing cousins?” She laughed in her turn.

Nearby was a corridor that brought me even more surprise. As we entered it, I heard a soft rattling sort of sound, a kind of chucka-chucka-chucka, growing closer. Around a corner came the figure of a white-faced woman dressed in a golden gown that trailed behind her, as did her long golden hair. It took my breath away as I realized that it was not a living person, nor a ghost, but a life-sized puppet. For one brief moment, I was utterly perplexed by it, then realized that it hung from fine strands that rose to tracks in the ceiling. It was not, in fact, that dissimilar to the mechanism that animated the puppets in the twins’ little theatre and, although impressive, was not, once you grasped

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