The Bell - Iris Murdoch [11]
'The lake is fed by three little rivers,' said James, 'which come into it at this end. Then there's one river leading out at the other end. Well, hardly a river, it seeps away through the marsh, actually.'
The Land-Rover clattered very slowly over a second bridge. Dora looked down and saw the stream, glittering green and weedy, through the slats of the bridge.
'You can't see the far end of the lake from here,' said James, 'because it turns round to the other side of the house. The lake is shaped like an L, an L upside down from here, of course. The house is in the crook of the L.'
They passed over the third bridge. The Land-Rover was turning to the left again, and Dora began to look for the house. It was immediately visible, presenting its side view to them, a rectangle of grey stone with three rows of windows. Below it, and set back a little from the drive, was a courtyard of stable buildings, surmounted by an elegant clock tower.
'And there's our market garden,' said James, pointing away to the right.
Dora saw an expanse of vegetable patches and greenhouses. Far beyond there was park land with great trees scattered upon it. The air was close and dusky. The distant greens were heavy with the final light of day, fading already and hazy.
The Land-Rover ran onto gravel and came to a standstill. They had reached the front of the house. Dora, suffocating with nervousness, felt the blood glowing in her face. Stiffly she began to get out of the car. James vaulted out at the back and came to help her. Her high-heeled shoes crunched onto the gravel. She stepped back and looked up at the house.
From here it looked less huge than it had seemed in the distance. Dora saw that the Corinthian pillars supported a wide portico over a balcony behind which the rooms of the first floor were set back. The twin flights of steps swept outward from the balcony, overlapping the two side wings of the house, and twisted back again to reach the ground not far from each other near the central point of the façade. Stone lions, sitting complacently cat-like, crowned the end of each stone banister, and between them could be seen a line of French windows, put in by some impious late nineteenth-century hand, leading into a large room on ground level. An elaborate stone medallion above these doors contained the message Amor via mea. A similar medallion surmounted the tall doorway up above on the balcony, above which a swathe of carved garlands led the eye upward to the stone flowers under the portico roof, dimly alive with the last reflections from the lake. Turning away from the house Dora saw that the gravel drive on which they stood was a terrace which ended at a stone balustrade, surmounted by urns, and a wide shallow flight of steps, cracked and somewhat overgrown by moss and grasses. A gentle grass slope led down to the lake, which lay close in front of the house, and from the steps a roughly mown path, flanked by precariously leaning yew trees, went to the water's edge.
'It's marvellous,' said Dora.
'It's not a bad example of its kind,' said Paul.
Dora knew from experience that nothing put Paul in a good humour so quickly as being able to show her something. He was looking up at the house with satisfaction, as if he had made it himself.
'A pupil of Inigo Jones,' he began.
'Better bustle up if we're going to make Compline,' said James. 'So sorry.' He started off up one of the flights of steps. The others began to trail after him.
James stopped, looking down on them from above. 'I suppose the newcomers would like to join us?' he said.
'Yes, please,' said Toby.