The Rich Man’s House

by Andrew McGahan

  Rita nodded, awkward in the presence of domestic staff. ‘Yes, of course.’

  Bradley gestured—in another time and place, Rita supposed, he might have been called a butler—and the maid took up the bags.

  ‘If there’s nothing else for the present, Ms Lang?’ the house manager enquired.

  ‘Thank you, no.’

  ‘Then we’ll be out of your way.’

  And the two domestics marched away again down the long hall.

  Watching them go, Rita noticed now that the floor, which she had thought was inlaid with coloured patterns, was in fact bare stone, polished to display the natural swirls and lines within the rock of the mountain. To either side of the central aisle, great rugs were spread, hosting suites of couches and low tables. But the main ornamentation of the Hall was art. Paintings hung everywhere, from the pillars, and upon the walls between the great windows. And sculptures of all sorts stood on podiums, some works in groups, some standing alone.

  ‘Shall we start the tour?’ Clara asked.

  Rita nodded, and followed the major-domo down the stairs.

  Clara waved a hand to the exhibits. ‘As you’ll have noticed, Mr Richman is a keen appreciator of art. What you see here is by no means his entire collection, of course—he has a gallery in New York, open to the public—these are just a few of his favourites. We won’t stop now, there’ll be plenty of time for you to look at them later, but you probably already recognise some of the more famous works.’

  They were walking down the aisle towards the far end of the Hall, where another great arch opened to some further vast space. Rita glanced about at the art. Did she recognise anything? She was no expert. But certainly, the works appeared to be the kind normally found in great museums, the styles classical, medieval, Renaissance. But she wasn’t really looking, her attention was drawn ever and again to the eastern windows, and to the vertical wonder that was the Wheel.

  The major-domo, following Rita’s gaze, gave a nod. ‘It’s not the clearest of days, sadly, so you can’t see the summit. But never fear, you’re bound to get a good look at it sometime during your stay. The forecast is for finer weather in the next day or so.’

  Two-thirds of the way down the Hall the aisle split to pass around a large oval opening in the floor, into which a curved staircase descended. Lights illuminated the stairs, but the chamber below, whatever it might be, was in darkness. Moreover, a chain was stretched across the upper landing—no real barrier, but the meaning of it plain.

  ‘Down there is the Museum,’ Clara explained as they passed by. ‘It’s not quite ready for guests yet; we’re waiting on a last important exhibit to be installed. But it’ll be open before you leave.’

  They moved on to the southern arch. Before passing through, Rita paused and looked back to see the Hall from the opposite perspective. It amazed her anew, so soaring, so light-filled and yet so naturally embedded within the mountain. But what she noticed most now was the humble foyer at the far end. From this angle it seemed less a mere antechamber and more a kind of sanctum, a focal point for the Hall—like a cathedral’s chancel or apse. The little chamber shone gold in the sunlight from the windows, as if the beams had been directed there on purpose. And taking on the air of a sacred altar was the enigmatic stone platform that she had first noticed—too high to be a bench, too low to be a table. And the thought struck her: why had her father put that there?

  The thought was chased by a realisation: her father had designed this entire Hall. This beautiful, wondrous space. He had conceived it, dreamed it up from nothing, created it from blank stone. Her father, whom she had dismissed for so long, along with all of his works.

  Rita lowered her head. Then, aware that the major-domo was waiting, she turned and followed her through the arch.

  ‘The Atrium,’ Clara announced.

  The space they had entered was almost too vast, and too complicated, to take in at once. From the archway, the great room spread beneath an enormous dome of carved rock and glass. On the far side of the space other grand rooms opened and expanded away—Rita had a fleeting impression of a library and a dining hall. But what captured her gaze most was an immense well that opened at the centre of the room, right beneath the crest of the dome, its rim lined by a stone balustrade. Dropping into the well was the most fantastic staircase she had even seen.

  It appeared at first—as Rita moved to the balustrade to see better—as if the structure was some mad kind of M.C. Escher illustration brought to life. Circular flights of stairs curled impossibly around other circles of stairs in a puzzle without end, the twined serpents forming a great column of stone that plummeted away into dimness.

  Clara came to the rescue. ‘Unnerving, isn’t it? This is the Double Helix Staircase. It’s two spiral staircases entwined in each other: whichever flight you take, it never meets the other one, though they both get you to the same place. A brilliant design, but in truth your father can’t take all the credit. This one is inspired by a similar, if much smaller, example in France, in the Château de Chambord. And that one was designed by an architect even greater than your father. Leonardo da Vinci.’

  Fighting vertigo, Rita followed the spirals with her eye, down and down. It took a notable mental effort to sort the pattern out, but yes, she could see it now, that way each helix curved in opposition to its twin. As the two stairways descended, the great tower they formed was joined by bridges that leapt out from landings positioned deeper within the well. Rita counted four such landings, widely spaced out, before a bottom could be glimpsed, maybe a hundred metres below, making the Double Helix Staircase as tall as a skyscraper. Christ, would she have to walk up and down the monstrous thing just to get around the place?

  The major-domo was ahead of her once more. ‘Don’t worry, there are also elevators—everyday, normal elevators—between all the levels. The stairs are great fun, however. And gorgeous to look at.’

  Rita suppressed a sigh of relief.

  The major-domo gestured to the rest of the Atrium. ‘Where we’re standing now is the Great Landing. Three of the grand public rooms open from this level. Behind us, of course, is the Entrance Hall, while over there is the Saloon, which extends on into the Library. Over there is the Dining Hall. And in the middle … Well, can you guess?’

  The Saloon and the Dining Hall were subsidiary caverns opening from the Atrium. Between them, where there should have been a dividing mass of solid stone, instead gleamed walls of glass, blue and shimmering: daylight filtering down through a great depth of water.

  ‘Is it a giant aquarium?’ Rita hazarded.

  Clara shook her head. ‘It’s the bottom of the Terrace Pool—the Terrace is directly above us. There’s a bigger pool, an indoor one, down on the recreational levels, but this one here is open to the sky. Shall we go up and see? We reach the Terrace this way.’

  The major-domo led Rita to a cast-iron spiral staircase that rose from a corner of the Great Landing to a balcony that ran around the base of Atrium dome. Rita ignored the vertiginous view down into the well, and instead studied the dome immediately overhead. It must be flat from above, for the windows that pierced it were shafts cut into the stone, deeper about the outer edge of the dome than the inner.

  A doorway opened from the north of the balcony. The two women passed through it, climbed another short flight of wide stairs, and emerged into what Rita at first thought must be the open air, so bright was the light. In truth, it was another enclosed space, carved from the Mount’s summit. But here almost no native stone was left, only a latticework that formed the frame for walls and roofs made entirely of glass. The effect was of a giant greenhouse—and indeed, many leafy plants and ferns grew here in raised beds, bathing in the sunshine.

  ‘This is the Conservatory,’ explained Clara. ‘The Terrace is lovely, of course, but given our altitude and the local climate, it’s usually too cold or too windy to go outside, so this serves as a sunroom.’

  Wicker furniture was scattered about, and a bar waited
at the rear, set into a cave-like recess. But Rita’s gaze went to the sky, revealed more fully than even in the Entrance Hall. The clouds and the sinking sun and the staggering rampart of the Wheel were all still performing their ballet of magnificence, but there was a new element added to the dance now, a sense of air and movement. A wind was blowing beyond the glass, its presence betrayed by streamers of cloud, wisps of mists no more, that were sailing sedately just above the Conservatory roof.

  ‘This way,’ Clara beckoned.

  Outside spread the Terrace. To reach it, however, Rita saw that a strange portal must be negotiated. It consisted of a short passageway of thick glass, at either end of which was a solid-looking door, one opening to the inside, the other opening out.

  ‘It’s an airlock,’ Clara explained. ‘Just one of the things you have to get used to up here. Every exit that opens to the outside is the same, and it’s a necessary precaution, trust me. The winds up here can get truly violent. If we had only normal doors, we’d have gales running wild through the house. But don’t worry, it’s all quite simple. The first thing to do, before going out, is to check on the weather. Here.’

  She was indicating a small display set beside the inner door. It was glowing green, and bore a list of figures, the top three of which were, Temp, –3 C. Wind Av, 11 kph. Wind Max, 24 kph.

  ‘Nice and mild, for now,’ the major-domo observed. ‘But you don’t have to worry about the exact numbers, all that really matters is the screen colour. If it’s green, then it’s safe to go outside. The screen will flash orange if conditions get more serious, say, if the temperature drops below minus twenty, or if the wind starts to gust over forty. Orange is a sign to think twice, and to rug up good and proper. And if conditions get worse than that, say minus forty, or a wind over seventy, the screen goes red. Don’t go outside then. The doors automatically lock at that point anyway and will only open with a manual override. So never fear, if things are really bad, you can’t accidentally blunder out into it.’

  Rita was staring out to the Terrace, which even in the glowing afternoon sun looked cold and terribly exposed. ‘What if the wind suddenly rises when you’re already out there?’

  Clara smiled, reassuring. ‘The override will always let you in, but there’s little chance you’d ever get caught by surprise out there anyway. The most sophisticated Doppler radar available is monitoring the Wheel at every moment, and warnings will sound on the Terrace and all balconies if any dangerous winds are on the way down.’

  Rita didn’t understand. ‘On the way down?’

  ‘On the way down from the mountain. That’s where our weather comes from, around here. It’s complicated to explain in detail, but the gist of it is that the Wheel, being so high, sticking right up into the stratosphere, can create some unusual and dramatic effects. One of them is that it can drag very powerful winds down from the upper atmosphere, and direct them towards us here on the Mount. I’m talking about jet-stream winds. Do you know what a jet stream is?’

  Rita nodded, hoping her expression gave nothing away. Did she know of the jet stream?! Christ, did she!

  ‘Well, you’ll understand then,’ said Clara. ‘You wouldn’t want to be out there when one hit. But you can’t miss the alarm. It sounds whenever the radar detects any mass of air descending the Wheel’s western face. I’ll show you.’ She pressed the screen of the weather display and a keyboard flashed up, upon which she typed in a code.

  Immediately, a voice awoke within the Conservatory, resonating from unseen loudspeakers; a woman’s voice, calm, but serious in tone. ‘The following alarm is a drill. Repeat, the following alarm is a drill.’ And after a pause of some seconds a shrill tone blared out, not overloud, but un-ignorable, and the recorded voice returned to declare, Emergency. Strong winds approaching. Seek shelter. Emergency. After which the alarm trilled once more, then fell silent.

  ‘You hear that, you get inside,’ said the major-domo. ‘There’s no need to panic, you’ll have several minutes at least. Just move calmly and get in here undercover. Then you’ll be fine, whatever comes.’ She glanced up at the ceiling. ‘Don’t be fooled by how delicate this all looks; that glass is heavily reinforced.’ Another smile. ‘Shall we go outside?’

  Rita swallowed her dread. She had to do it at least once, she supposed. ‘Lead the way.’

  Clara nodded to an alcove near the airlock in which maybe half-a-dozen long heavy coats, fur-trimmed, hung on hooks. ‘There’re always overcoats here, if you don’t have one with you. But I don’t think we’ll need them for just a quick jaunt.’

  She lifted the latch. It was a sliding door, and pushing it aside, she ushered Rita through, then closed it carefully behind. ‘It’s a failsafe system,’ the major-domo commented. ‘The outer door can’t open unless the inner door is shut, and vice versa.’

  She opened the outer door and the two women stepped through into the clear air of the mountaintop. Cold sang against Rita’s face, but not bitter in that first instant; rather it was refreshing after the warm stillness of inside, the breeze tasting faintly of salt, even two thousand eight hundred metres above the frigid Southern Ocean.

  The Terrace spread before them, laid in flagstones. ‘This was originally a natural hollow in the peak, even before it was levelled out during construction,’ said Clara. ‘Which is why this spot has been used so often over the years. It was a good place to set up weather shacks and satellite dishes and the like. All gone now, of course.’

  What remained was a wide court utterly open to the sky, without roof or awning of any kind. Nor was there any furniture, other than benches cut here and there into convenient protrusions of rock. Only one feature broke this puritan simplicity; a large circle of wind-ruffled water: the Terrace Pool. It was shaped to look like a naturally formed pond in the stone, and the surface steamed slightly.

  ‘It’s heated, of course,’ said the major-domo, as they approached the water, ‘otherwise it would freeze. And there’s an even warmer spa there in the corner, beautiful on a cold night. But be warned, if you’re not a good swimmer, the pool is very deep at this northern end, close to ten metres, reaching all the way down to the Atrium below, as you saw.’

  They paused a moment to peer into the depths, but of the chambers below, nothing could be guessed.

  Clara led them on, towards the eastern side of the Terrace. Here, a chest-high parapet of stone formed a protective railing. Beyond it was an open gap of air, and then the Wheel.

  They drew near to the edge, and Rita had to take a slow breath to still her terror. She tried to keep her eyes on the icy heights of the Wheel, not the fall that was opening below her. But vertigo was inescapable, even looking upwards, so appallingly did the mountain rise and rise. To let her gaze lift too high was to feel herself tugged towards the heavens, as if gravity was reversed and she would fall into the sky.

  But when she gave in and lowered her gaze—they stood against the parapet now—it only fell through the middle airs without finding any purchase at all, an eagle plummeting, until, perhaps a thousand metres below her, the eternal rain clouds blanketed the ocean beneath. And even worse: as she stared down, a mocking wind oozed up the side of the mount and curled around her throat, cruel and cold.

  It was impossible to believe, in awful moments like this, that there had ever been a time when she had not suffered with heights. But there had been, there had. For her first three decades, Rita had been free of all vertigo, unafraid to stand at a cliff edge, unafraid of flying. But then had come the hideous trip to LA, during which, amid her breakdown, she had learned—staring wide-eyed, clear through the fuselage of the plane—just what kinds of presences could stalk the wild upper airs.

  Nothing had been the same since. Even now, over twelve years later and an atheist to the very religion that she had founded, even now, it was so easy to feel, in the wind as it crept up the mountainside, those same presences, so malign, so untamed, so hateful of all intruders into their realm, prowling in the great abyss of air at her feet. />
  ‘You okay?’ asked Clara.

  Rita had stepped back, hands to her eyes to block the terrible sight. ‘I’m fine,’ she said, fighting the nausea. ‘Just bad with heights.’

  ‘Ah. Is that why you don’t fly? But you really don’t have to worry, you’re perfectly safe here—you’d have to voluntarily climb up and over the wall to be in any danger whatsoever.’

  But that was the thing, of course, with vertigo. The conviction that you might do exactly that, voluntarily jump, lost in the spell.

  Rita calmed herself, however, with another deep breath, and a further step back from the parapet. She turned towards the end of the Terrace. ‘And what’s up there?’ she asked.

  The great wedge of the Mount’s summit ridge, which had widened around the Terrace, narrowed again to the south. At the same time it leapt up in a great mass of stone, a giant tooth that towered maybe forty metres over the Terrace. This tooth was, in fact, the true and final summit of the Mount. At its base, stairs ran up to a porch and a doorway set into the stone; and above the doorway the rock was punctuated with windows and recessed balconies, rising even to the very tip.

  ‘That’s Mr Richman’s private residence,’ said Clara. ‘The Cottage. It’s his retreat away from the rest of the Observatory, a more intimate space for him and his family, much cosier than the grand rooms below, though just as well appointed, and with the finest views of all.’

  Views? Rita could imagine. From within that upraised tooth the open air would call horrifically on every side. Her gaze went to the blunt peak, and she realised that it had been cut away, replaced by a domed roof or room that seemed to be made entirely of glass.

  The major-domo too was staring up. ‘I’m afraid our little tour can’t take in the Cottage. Entry there is only at Mr Richman’s invitation. But it is extraordinary in places, that topmost chamber in particular. I won’t try to describe it—hopefully you will see it yourself one day. But I’ll say this much, its nickname is the Lightning Room.’