Malice in Miniature Read Online Free Page B

wasn’t sure whether he looked more like the first assistant elf in Santa’s workshop, minus the beard, or one of those little cartoon demons with horns, tail, and red tights. The elf, I decided, but something of a thorn in Santa’s side, perhaps. He would be good at working on tiny objects, but not fond of taking orders.
    I stood, properly shod, and extended my hand. “You must be Mr.—er—Sir Mordred Brocklesby, and my name is Dorothy Martin.” Alan and I had agreed that it was more practical for me to keep my old name when we married; when an American marries an Englishman there are enough legal complications without a name change thrown in. And I’d been Dorothy Martin for over forty years; I wasn’t sure I could adjust to Nesbitt “I live in Sherebury,” I went on, “but I’ve never managed to get out here to the Hall before. I certainly could have chosen a better day, couldn’t I?”
    â€œNot at all, not at all,” said the elf. “I shall be pleased to devote myself entirely to you. I am indeed Mordred Brocklesby, and I am delighted to meet you.” There was something so condescendingly regal about his manner I was half-surprised he didn’t refer to himself as “One.” I would have liked to meet the young woman, too, but Sir Mordred plainly considered her a part of the furniture. So I smiled at her and paid my admission fee while Sir Mordred studied the ceiling, apparently finding the exchange of money in his house to be indelicate.
    He wasn’t shy, however, about turning the house into a museum. Chattering away in a fluting alto, he led me through a doorway into the great hall of the house. “As you will see, I have devoted my house, and indeed my life, to the preservation of the art of the miniature. I refer, of course, not to small paintings, as the term is often used, but to dolls’ houses and their appurtenances. You are interested in miniatures?”
    â€œI confess, I know very little about them. I am interested in architecture, though, and I’ve heard a great deal about this house.”
    I raised my head as I spoke, to examine the carved and painted ceiling with its huge crystal chandelier, and ran smack into Sir Mordred, who had stopped dead in his tracks. I started to apologize, but he waved his hands in agitated fashion.
    â€œNo, no, it was my fault, but, my dear lady! I do
beg
of you not to mention this house in the same breath as the word ‘architecture.’ This is not architecture! This is a nightmare, an unharmonious horror, a travesty! Just
look
at it!” he wailed, pointing dramatically.
    I obediently looked. He was pointing to the staircase, and it was worth looking at. I had never seen anything like the plaster work that adorned that staircase and its ceiling. Draperies, tasseled ropes, garlands, cherubs, satyrs, nymphs, the odd lion here and there, all in white and gold, and all jostling for space amidst the carved wood and marble beams, balusters, railings, and stair treads, not to mention an occasional mirror or trompe l’oeil window.
    There was something oddly unpleasant about the effect. Were the proportions wrong? I didn’t know enough about such things to be sure. Perhaps it was the leering expressions on the statuary, or the unexpected angles, or the streaky, rather warped mirrors. Or, more likely, I was still in my Gothic fantasy and was imagining the whole thing.
    I blinked and looked back at Sir Mordred. “Yes. Well.”
    He nodded, satisfied. “If it were not for the space demands of the museum, I should never live here—never. Now you must allow me to show you some genuine architecture. Just through here, and I should advise you to avert your eyes from the visual discord on all sides.”
    We passed into a dark corridor which, ignoring Sir Mordred’s advice, I studied with a sort of horrified fascination. The prevailing color scheme was dirty cream