His face was like a rusted mirror, stippled with a million cracks. He was the most ancient-looking person Effy had ever seen.
“Euphemia!” he said, with a rattling, excited gasp. “I’m so glad you took me up on my invitation.”
And then he seized her around the middle in a zealous but creaky embrace. Effy stiffened, unsure what to do, waiting for it to be over.
At last Blackmar let go, knifepoint eyes shining out of his shriveled-walnut face.
“Oh,” Effy said as he released her, feeling breathless. “Thank you very much for having us.”
“I’m always happy to entertain my admirers.” Blackmar smiled. From that close, Effy could see that nearly a third of his teeth were missing, and that they had all been replaced with gold imitations. “Is this your . . . compatriot?”
“Yes,” said Effy. “This is Preston Héloury.”
Blackmar’s wrinkled brow wrinkled even further. “Héloury,” he repeated slowly. In his posh Llyrian accent, he made the Argantian name sound almost like a curse. “That name is familiar—you’re a student at the literature college, aren’t you? You’ve written to me before.”
“I have.” Preston’s posture was stiff, arms folded over his chest. “I’m an admirer as well, just not as, ah, eloquent as Effy in expressing it. Euphemia.”
He had a bit of trouble with the first syllable; Effy could see the small furrow in his brow as he tried, with his subtle Argantian accent, to pronounce it.
Hearing her full name in Preston’s mouth for the first time made Effy feel strange. Not unpleasant, but distinctly odd, her skin prickling with unexpected heat. With the added effort that it took to articulate them, the vowels sounded softer somehow. Gentler.
“Well, Argantians are not known for their zeal or passion. Too cold up there in the mountains, I suppose.” Blackmar chuckled, very taken with his own joke. “Come in, both of you. I’ll get you some brandy.”
He had two black-clad domestic workers take their trunks from Preston’s car and carry them silently up the steps to the house.
Effy and Preston followed slowly. The low, flat clouds were hanging darkly around the turrets of Penrhos manor, almost enveloping them, like a pair of gloved hands. The domestics set down the trunks briefly to heave the doors open, and then they all stepped over the threshold.
Inside was as grand as Effy had expected: a double staircase of white marble that led up to the second-floor landing, plush velvet carpets that matched Blackmar’s slippers and dressing gown, damask wallpaper bulleted with gilt-framed paintings and portraits. A large tapestry rendered the Blackmar family tree, beginning with one Rolant Blackmar, who Effy assumed was that industrialist—oil or railroads.
Above it was an enormous taxidermy deer head, its black eyes gleaming emptily, staring at nothing.
“It’s beautiful,” Effy said, because she felt it was what she was expected to say, and because it saved Preston from having to lie again.
Penrhos was beautiful, in a particular way. It was perfectly ornate, the furniture and wallpaper and rugs impeccably matched, not a smear of dust or a cache of cobwebs in the corner. The portraits were all dour and unsmiling; the velvet curtains let in not a sliver of light. There were no audaciously kitschy lamps or brashly abstract paintings, no boldly ugly chandeliers that made you want to squint up at them, trying to gauge if they really were ugly or not.
It was a beautiful house, but not a clever one. It was a house with no imagination.
Effy found it almost impossible to believe that Angharad’s author could live here.
“Thank you, thank you,” Blackmar said, waving a hand. “But you haven’t even seen the best of it yet. Come into the study. I’m sure you’ll want to relax after your long drive.”
Effy did not feel that drinking with Blackmar would be relaxing at all, but she followed him into the study anyway, Preston just a pace behind her.
The study had the same cohesion: peacock-blue drapes and matching armchairs, which were lovely, but not exactly inspiring. Another taxidermy deer head was mounted over the doorway, and a grandfather clock ticked dully in the corner. It was around six fifteen.
The domestics had vanished; Blackmar poured the brandy himself, wizened hand trembling. He handed Effy and Preston each a cut-crystal glass.
Brandy was an odd choice. Effy had only ever seen her grandparents drink it, just one after-dinner swig of liquor served in a minuscule glass. It wasn’t rude, precisely, to serve brandy without offering a meal first, but it gave Effy the distinct sense that something was slightly off with Blackmar.