CHAPTER XVII
The Palace Hotel, appealing for encouragement mainly to English andAmerican travellers, celebrated the opening of its doors, as a matterof course, by the giving of a grand banquet, and the delivery of a longsuccession of speeches.
Delayed on his journey, Henry Westwick only reached Venice in time tojoin the guests over their coffee and cigars. Observing the splendourof the reception rooms, and taking note especially of the artfulmixture of comfort and luxury in the bedchambers, he began to share theold nurse's view of the future, and to contemplate seriously the comingdividend of ten per cent. The hotel was beginning well, at all events.So much interest in the enterprise had been aroused, at home andabroad, by profuse advertising, that the whole accommodation of thebuilding had been secured by travellers of all nations for the openingnight. Henry only obtained one of the small rooms on the upper floor,by a lucky accident--the absence of the gentleman who had written toengage it. He was quite satisfied, and was on his way to bed, whenanother accident altered his prospects for the night, and moved himinto another and a better room.
Ascending on his way to the higher regions as far as the first floor ofthe hotel, Henry's attention was attracted by an angry voiceprotesting, in a strong New England accent, against one of the greatesthardships that can be inflicted on a citizen of the United States--thehardship of sending him to bed without gas in his room.
The Americans are not only the most hospitable people to be found onthe face of the earth--they are (under certain conditions) the mostpatient and good-tempered people as well. But they are human; and thelimit of American endurance is found in the obsolete institution of abedroom candle. The American traveller, in the present case, declinedto believe that his bedroom was in a complete finished state without agas-burner. The manager pointed to the fine antique decorations(renewed and regilt) on the walls and the ceiling, and explained thatthe emanations of burning gas-light would certainly spoil them in thecourse of a few months. To this the traveller replied that it waspossible, but that he did not understand decorations. A bedroom withgas in it was what he was used to, was what he wanted, and was what hewas determined to have. The compliant manager volunteered to ask someother gentleman, housed on the inferior upper storey (which was litthroughout with gas), to change rooms. Hearing this, and being quitewilling to exchange a small bedchamber for a large one, Henryvolunteered to be the other gentleman. The excellent American shookhands with him on the spot. 'You are a cultured person, sir,' he said;'and you will no doubt understand the decorations.'
Henry looked at the number of the room on the door as he opened it.The number was Fourteen.
Tired and sleepy, he naturally anticipated a good night's rest. In thethoroughly healthy state of his nervous system, he slept as well in abed abroad as in a bed at home. Without the slightest assignablereason, however, his just expectations were disappointed. Theluxurious bed, the well-ventilated room, the delicious tranquillity ofVenice by night, all were in favour of his sleeping well. He neverslept at all. An indescribable sense of depression and discomfort kepthim waking through darkness and daylight alike. He went down to thecoffee-room as soon as the hotel was astir, and ordered some breakfast.Another unaccountable change in himself appeared with the appearance ofthe meal. He was absolutely without appetite. An excellent omelette,and cutlets cooked to perfection, he sent away untasted--he, whoseappetite never failed him, whose digestion was still equal to anydemands on it!
The day was bright and fine. He sent for a gondola, and was rowed tothe Lido.
Out on the airy Lagoon, he felt like a new man. He had not left thehotel ten minutes before he was fast asleep in the gondola. Waking, onreaching the landing-place, he crossed the Lido, and enjoyed amorning's swim in the Adriatic. There was only a poor restaurant onthe island, in those days; but his appetite was now ready for anything;he ate whatever was offered to him, like a famished man. He couldhardly believe, when he reflected on it, that he had sent away untastedhis excellent breakfast at the hotel.
Returning to Venice, he spent the rest of the day in thepicture-galleries and the churches. Towards six o'clock his gondolatook him back, with another fine appetite, to meet some travellingacquaintances with whom he had engaged to dine at the table d'hote.
The dinner was deservedly rewarded with the highest approval by everyguest in the hotel but one. To Henry's astonishment, the appetite withwhich he had entered the house mysteriously and completely left himwhen he sat down to table. He could drink some wine, but he couldliterally eat nothing. 'What in the world is the matter with you?' histravelling acquaintances asked. He could honestly answer, 'I know nomore than you do.'
When night came, he gave his comfortable and beautiful bedroom anothertrial. The result of the second experiment was a repetition of theresult of the first. Again he felt the all-pervading sense ofdepression and discomfort. Again he passed a sleepless night. Andonce more, when he tried to eat his breakfast, his appetite completelyfailed him!
This personal experience of the new hotel was too extraordinary to bepassed over in silence. Henry mentioned it to his friends in thepublic room, in the hearing of the manager. The manager, naturallyzealous in defence of the hotel, was a little hurt at the impliedreflection cast on Number Fourteen. He invited the travellers presentto judge for themselves whether Mr. Westwick's bedroom was to blame forMr. Westwick's sleepless nights; and he especially appealed to agrey-headed gentleman, a guest at the breakfast-table of an Englishtraveller, to take the lead in the investigation. 'This is DoctorBruno, our first physician in Venice,' he explained. 'I appeal to himto say if there are any unhealthy influences in Mr. Westwick's room.'
Introduced to Number Fourteen, the doctor looked round him with acertain appearance of interest which was noticed by everyone present.'The last time I was in this room,' he said, 'was on a melancholyoccasion. It was before the palace was changed into an hotel. I wasin professional attendance on an English nobleman who died here.' Oneof the persons present inquired the name of the nobleman. Doctor Brunoanswered (without the slightest suspicion that he was speaking before abrother of the dead man), 'Lord Montbarry.'
Henry quietly left the room, without saying a word to anybody.
He was not, in any sense of the term, a superstitious man. But hefelt, nevertheless, an insurmountable reluctance to remaining in thehotel. He decided on leaving Venice. To ask for another room wouldbe, as he could plainly see, an offence in the eyes of the manager. Toremove to another hotel, would be to openly abandon an establishment inthe success of which he had a pecuniary interest. Leaving a note forArthur Barville, on his arrival in Venice, in which he merely mentionedthat he had gone to look at the Italian lakes, and that a lineaddressed to his hotel at Milan would bring him back again, he took theafternoon train to Padua--and dined with his usual appetite, and sleptas well as ever that night.
The next day, a gentleman and his wife (perfect strangers to theMontbarry family), returning to England by way of Venice, arrived atthe hotel and occupied Number Fourteen.
Still mindful of the slur that had been cast on one of his bestbedchambers, the manager took occasion to ask the travellers the nextmorning how they liked their room. They left him to judge for himselfhow well they were satisfied, by remaining a day longer in Venice thanthey had originally planned to do, solely for the purpose of enjoyingthe excellent accommodation offered to them by the new hotel. 'We havemet with nothing like it in Italy,' they said; 'you may rely on ourrecommending you to all our friends.'
On the day when Number Fourteen was again vacant, an English ladytravelling alone with her maid arrived at the hotel, saw the room, andat once engaged it.
The lady was Mrs. Norbury. She had left Francis Westwick at Milan,occupied in negotiating for the appearance at his theatre of the newdancer at the Scala. Not having heard to the contrary, Mrs. Norburysupposed that Arthur Barville and his wife had already arrived atVenice. She was more interested in meeting the young married couplethan in awaiting the result of the hard bargaining
which delayed theengagement of the new dancer; and she volunteered to make her brother'sapologies, if his theatrical business caused him to be late in keepinghis appointment at the honeymoon festival.
Mrs. Norbury's experience of Number Fourteen differed entirely from herbrother Henry's experience of the room.
Falling asleep as readily as usual, her repose was disturbed by asuccession of frightful dreams; the central figure in every one of thembeing the figure of her dead brother, the first Lord Montbarry. Shesaw him starving in a loathsome prison; she saw him pursued byassassins, and dying under their knives; she saw him drowning inimmeasurable depths of dark water; she saw him in a bed on fire,burning to death in the flames; she saw him tempted by a shadowycreature to drink, and dying of the poisonous draught. The reiteratedhorror of these dreams had such an effect on her that she rose with thedawn of day, afraid to trust herself again in bed. In the old times,she had been noted in the family as the one member of it who lived onaffectionate terms with Montbarry. His other sister and his brotherswere constantly quarrelling with him. Even his mother owned that hereldest son was of all her children the child whom she least liked.Sensible and resolute woman as she was, Mrs. Norbury shuddered withterror as she sat at the window of her room, watching the sunrise, andthinking of her dreams.
She made the first excuse that occurred to her, when her maid came inat the usual hour, and noticed how ill she looked. The woman was of sosuperstitious a temperament that it would have been in the last degreeindiscreet to trust her with the truth. Mrs. Norbury merely remarkedthat she had not found the bed quite to her liking, on account of thelarge size of it. She was accustomed at home, as her maid knew, tosleep in a small bed. Informed of this objection later in the day, themanager regretted that he could only offer to the lady the choice ofone other bedchamber, numbered Thirty-eight, and situated immediatelyover the bedchamber which she desired to leave. Mrs. Norbury acceptedthe proposed change of quarters. She was now about to pass her secondnight in the room occupied in the old days of the palace by Baron Rivar.
Once more, she fell asleep as usual. And, once more, the frightfuldreams of the first night terrified her, following each other in thesame succession. This time her nerves, already shaken, were not equalto the renewed torture of terror inflicted on them. She threw on herdressing-gown, and rushed out of her room in the middle of the night.The porter, alarmed by the banging of the door, met her hurryingheadlong down the stairs, in search of the first human being she couldfind to keep her company. Considerably surprised at this last newmanifestation of the famous 'English eccentricity,' the man looked atthe hotel register, and led the lady upstairs again to the roomoccupied by her maid. The maid was not asleep, and, more wonderfulstill, was not even undressed. She received her mistress quietly.When they were alone, and when Mrs. Norbury had, as a matter ofnecessity, taken her attendant into her confidence, the woman made avery strange reply.
'I have been asking about the hotel, at the servants' supper to-night,'she said. 'The valet of one of the gentlemen staying here has heardthat the late Lord Montbarry was the last person who lived in thepalace, before it was made into an hotel. The room he died in, ma'am,was the room you slept in last night. Your room tonight is the roomjust above it. I said nothing for fear of frightening you. For my ownpart, I have passed the night as you see, keeping my light on, andreading my Bible. In my opinion, no member of your family can hope tobe happy or comfortable in this house.'
'What do you mean?'
'Please to let me explain myself, ma'am. When Mr. Henry Westwick washere (I have this from the valet, too) he occupied the room his brotherdied in (without knowing it), like you. For two nights he never closedhis eyes. Without any reason for it (the valet heard him tell thegentlemen in the coffee-room) he could not sleep; he felt so low and sowretched in himself. And what is more, when daytime came, he couldn'teven eat while he was under this roof. You may laugh at me, ma'am--buteven a servant may draw her own conclusions. It's my conclusion thatsomething happened to my lord, which we none of us know about, when hedied in this house. His ghost walks in torment until he can tellit--and the living persons related to him are the persons who feel heis near them. Those persons may yet see him in the time to come.Don't, pray don't stay any longer in this dreadful place! I wouldn'tstay another night here myself--no, not for anything that could beoffered me!'
Mrs. Norbury at once set her servant's mind at ease on this last point.
'I don't think about it as you do,' she said gravely. 'But I shouldlike to speak to my brother of what has happened. We will go back toMilan.'
Some hours necessarily elapsed before they could leave the hotel, bythe first train in the forenoon.
In that interval, Mrs. Norbury's maid found an opportunity ofconfidentially informing the valet of what had passed between hermistress and herself. The valet had other friends to whom he relatedthe circumstances in his turn. In due course of time, the narrative,passing from mouth to mouth, reached the ears of the manager. Heinstantly saw that the credit of the hotel was in danger, unlesssomething was done to retrieve the character of the room numberedFourteen. English travellers, well acquainted with the peerage oftheir native country, informed him that Henry Westwick and Mrs. Norburywere by no means the only members of the Montbarry family. Curiositymight bring more of them to the hotel, after hearing what had happened.The manager's ingenuity easily hit on the obvious means of misleadingthem, in this case. The numbers of all the rooms were enamelled inblue, on white china plates, screwed to the doors. He ordered a newplate to be prepared, bearing the number, '13 A'; and he kept the roomempty, after its tenant for the time being had gone away, until theplate was ready. He then re-numbered the room; placing the removedNumber Fourteen on the door of his own room (on the second floor),which, not being to let, had not previously been numbered at all. Bythis device, Number Fourteen disappeared at once and for ever from thebooks of the hotel, as the number of a bedroom to let.
Having warned the servants to beware of gossiping with travellers, onthe subject of the changed numbers, under penalty of being dismissed,the manager composed his mind with the reflection that he had done hisduty to his employers. 'Now,' he thought to himself, with an excusablesense of triumph, 'let the whole family come here if they like! Thehotel is a match for them.'