The Chateau d'Argol Read Free

the edifice from top to bottom. The furniture of the room, as though crushed by the enormous height, seemed to be squatting on the ground, and consisted of piles of white and grey furs forming low couches, tables of ebony and mother-of-pearl, gracefully carved pieces of Breton oak, deep and low tapestried armchairs loaded with cushions of a sulphuric yellow, so brilliant that a sort of phosphorescence seemed to emanate from it, and which can only be compared with a certain yellow to be seen in some of Gauguin's paintings. Rectangular tapestries of faded hues only partially concealed the white stone walls. But above all, the unique, the wonder-working effect of the room came from the disposition of the lighting. Through horizontal loopholes surged continuous sheets of light that divided the apartment in height by immaterial pulsating partitions almost entirely concealing the ceiling, which was made of a scaffolding of rough beams and gables through whose interstices the sun, coming through a skylight, fell in long streamers to the floor. The ogival windows, piercing the thick walls, separated the room, in their turn, into clean-cut vertical panels of raw light, leaving zones of rigid shadow between them where the eye came to rest on lustreless surfaces. In the lower portion of the hall, the tall pointed windows were hung with a light silk fabric intricately patterned in leaves and flowers; this filtered light, glaucous and softly yellow, seemed to be coming from some marine depth, and bathed the entire lower regions of the room in a uniformly warm glow like a luminous sediment, transparent and compact, while a few feet above, throughout the entire upper plane, the fierce rays of the sun ran riot. This stratification made each plane immediately apparent to the eye, and the contrast between the extravagant luxury displayed in the soft light of the ground level and the rough ceiling where the magic of sunlight in all its power alone held sway overwhelmed the soul with a sort of delirious bliss, warming Albert's heart, as he started up the turret stairs of varnished wood that creaked with every step and were as sonorous as a ship's hull.
    As he emerged from the stairway out onto the castle terrace like the bridge of a tall ship riding the waves, the full splendour of the sunlight, until now merely interpreted by the copper plates, the slender ogives, the thick and silken walls, burst upon him in all its unbridled freedom. The fresh and powerful breeze that swept the terrace and bowed down the ocean of trees two hundred feet below, fairly took his breath away. The dishevelled folds of the silk pennons, that could be heard clacking now close at hand, like a ship's sails, sent dancing shadows flowing everywhere, and the eye was dazzled by the billowing light on the white stones. Meanwhile this feast of sunlight seemed to spread over utterly solitary wastes. Toward the north where the rocky spur ended in abrupt precipices, the high moors, yellow and smooth, were cut by the capricious wanderings of a deep valley filled with trees that appeared to stop abruptly, as though the rude breath of the ocean had sheared off every branch and twig rising above the level surface of the plateau. At a distance that to the eye seemed infinite, the valley, as it spread out, cut the line of cliffs marking the horizon, and through this triangular notch a small bay could be seen edged with foam and bordered by white, deserted beaches. This little inlet, where not a sail was to be seen, startled the eye by its perfect immobility: it looked like a smear of deep blue paint. Beyond this notch, the low chain that Albert had noticed from the road hid the cliffs from view, and here undulating country began, a stark bold landscape without a tree to be seen anywhere. Great greyish marshes extended along the foot of the last slopes as far as the eastern horizon.
    To the south stretched the highlands of Storrvan. From the foot of the castle walls the forest spread