Now they seemed like such trivial things to try to attach such meaning to.
I squared my shoulders and mounted the steps to the great double doors.
One swung open before I could knock. A distinguished-looking gentleman with silver hair and a dark suit greeted me with a cordial nod.
"Ms. Shaw," he said.
"Let me guess," I interrupted, unable to help myself. "Mr. Thorne is waiting."
The man-an honest-to-goodness butler? I wondered-treated me to an indulgent smile. "Indeed, Ms. Shaw. And he will see you now. Come this way."
I stepped inside the foyer, a vast landing before a central set of marble stairs that rose up in front of me, wide enough for a dozen people to mount shoulder-to-shoulder. Two more staircases, each half as wide, flanked it, leading down. Under my feet, an elaborate geometry of inlaid marble spread out, dizzying to examine too closely.
I surrendered my coat to the butler, who made it disappear behind a cast bronze door set into the wall on one side.
"This way, if you please, Ms. Shaw," the man said.
He led the way up the stairs, and I followed. I found myself in a kind of antechamber, separated from the main space by a row of broad columns.
"This floor is the piano nobile, Ms. Shaw," the butler said, stopping at the edge of the room.
I gaped.
It looked like the lobby of some extravagant hotel from a classic Hollywood film, all scarlet upholstery, rich woods, and precious oriental rugs. The space was so vast that the room was divided into a dozen different conversational areas with screens and plants, sculptures and furniture groupings. A two-story colonnade surrounded it, each floor at least fifteen feet high, with a wide corridor behind the columns below and a matching mezzanine above. Above the upper colonnade, the room was ringed with a fresco of classical figures in elegant postures.
"A follower of Botticelli, Ms. Shaw," the butler said comfortably, following my gaze. "Brought from Italy by Mr. Thorne many years ago."
Light filtered down from the clerestory windows above, and only then came the ceiling, divided into coffers which were painted in a variety of mythological and biblical themes and hung with sixteen vast and branching chandeliers.
"Ms. Shaw," the butler said politely, rousing me from my frozen state.
"Coming," I said, still feeling somewhat stunned.
The man led the way behind the colonnade, passing several tall paneled doors before turning down a side corridor that was wider than my room.
"The main east gallery," he said. It was hung with paintings from floor to ceiling-portraits, landscapes, allegorical scenes all in a great jumble, with the only breaks to make spaces for the doors that occasionally interrupted the long walls. I couldn't imagine what it was all worth.