Mary Stewart by This Rough Magic

Author:This Rough Magic
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2012-06-01T14:52:08+00:00

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Chapter Twelve

My cellar is in a rock by th’ seaside where my wine is hid.

Act II, Scene 2

A wide flight of stone steps led downwards from just beyond the door. Max touched a switch, and a weak yellow light came on to show us the way. He shut the ponderous door, and I heard a key grate in the lock behind us.

“I’ll go first, shall I?”

I followed him, curiously looking about me. The rest of the building had led me to expect goodness knew what horrors down here: it would hardly have come as a surprise to have found mouldering skeletons dangling in chains from the walls. But the underground corridor into which the stairs led us was innocent of anything except racks for wine—largely empty—which lined the wide passageway. The floor was clean, and the walls surprisingly free of the dust and webs which would have accumulated in a similar place in England. The air smelled fresh, and slightly damp.

I said as much to Max, who nodded. “You’ll see why in a minute. This is the official wine cellar, but it leads off into a natural cave farther along. I don’t know where the opening is—it’s probably no bigger than a chimney—but the air’s always fresh, and you can smell the sea. There are more wine racks down there. In the last century, when one drank one’s four bottles a day, rather a lot of room was needed. Anyway, it must have seemed a natural to use the caves in the cliff when they built the Castello.”

“It’s rather exciting. I suppose these are the caves your father was talking about.”

“Yes. Most of the cliffs along this coast have caves in them, but as you can imagine, he’d love to think the Castello cave was the original Prospero’s cell. When I point out that it doesn’t look as if it had ever been open to the outside air, he says that doesn’t matter. I gather it’s more ‘poetic truth,’ like the marmosets.”

“Well, it’s a lovely romantic theory, and I’m all for it! After all, what are facts? We get those every day… Whereabouts are we now in relation to ‘outside’?”

“At present we’re still moving along under the foundations of the house. The cave itself is in the southern headland, fairly deep down. We go down more steps in a moment, and then there’s a natural passage through to the cave. Wait, here we are.”

He had stopped two thirds of the way along the corridor, and put a hand up to the empty racks. I watched him, puzzled. He laid hold of what looked like part of the wall of racks, and pulled. Ponderously, and by no means silently, a narrow section swung out into the corridor. Beyond where it had been was a gap in the wall, opening on blackness.

“Goodness me!” I exclaimed, and Max laughed.

“Marvellous, isn’t it? I tell you, the Castello’s got everything! As a matter of fact, I have a suspicion that old Forli kept

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