domingo, 3 de outubro de 2010

THE ABANDONED HOUSE Chapter II (TEMPORARY)

II
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Ema inserted the key in the lock and she struggled to make it turn. Then, they both had to push the door, which was drooping and swollen.
«Well» Daniel said «one thing we’ll have to change it’s the doors...»
«I can hardly believe it’s really mine», Ema exclaimed, not caring about the apparent state of advanced deterioration of the elements that comprised the mansion.
It was almost noon and the sun shone shyly through the door left open, as if it was afraid of being an intruder in a house it had stopped frequenting for so long.
The house wasn’t exactly furnished but it did have some furniture which the previous owners had left behind. The dining room – the first place they entered after crossing the hallway – was huge like a palace’s Great Hall and in it there was only a long table, which could accommodate more than twenty people. It was covered in dust, and so was the floor. Only one of the windows still had what was left of the windowpane. All the others had been completely broken. In the first floor, besides the dining room, there was a bathroom, a living room and a wide Great Hall which seemed to have been built later than the rest of the house, like an annex, with a bookcase full of books. The ceiling from that room formed a roof terrace and there was a window onto a great depression in the terrain, big enough to cause a deadly fall to someone less cautious. Ema shook her had, disapprovingly. «How can someone leave all these books behind?»
She held some in her hands and discovered she now possessed some real antiques. Priceless items. She was happy to realize that although there were so many books, there was still room for her own books. To the right of the wide space that formed the hallway there was a small door, just high enough to let someone in or out.
«According to the blueprints», Daniel said, «it’s the kitchen».
Although it was not locked, just like the front door, time had caused the hinges to loosen and the door to droop, and they had to push hard to open it.
On the top floor there were three rooms which had been – and again would be – bedrooms. There was also another bathroom and another small room, which might have been a sewing room or a nursery. Only one of the bedrooms had a bed. And there was a chest of drawers in one of the others. Not only were they dusty but the spiders had spun their webs everywhere and some of the books in the library had succumbed to the bookworms.











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