Chapter Two
Tonight, as on every night he was at home, Ramesh, his meticulous, erudite Major Domo, shrouded Ward’s bedroom in preparation for sleep. The only light penetrated through a two inch opening between the heavy gold damask drapes on the window closest to the bed.
As in many “grandes dames” Victorians, the room was extravagant in both size and ornamentation. It occupied the southwest corner of the third floor – actually most of the west side of the old mansion. The south and west exterior walls were almost entirely consumed by wide, massively trimmed, floor to ceiling leaded glass windows separated at the corner by a whimsical, attenuated turret. Except for a framework of heavy rafters tinged dark with age, the turret was open inside to its slightly skewed conical rooftop and win
