Part 1

  His interest in the camera abated, Jacob shuffles his feet a little, looking around the room a little abstractedly.  "Well, now, if the Master or Missus was here, they'd take you into the parlor and have some tea brought to you, but I'm not quite allowed in the parlor most days.  Caroline says I magic new dust and stains into being just by crossing the threshold."
  I have to grin at this, noting the smuts on his originally white shirt, as well as the drip marks on the floor around us both.  "That's alright. Though I'd love to see more of the house, if you think it would be okay?"
  Jacob perks up at this. "Of course! I've heard the Master give tours to his visitors so many times, I have 'most all of his explanations learned by heart."
  An idea strikes me.  Meres isn't here for me to meet himself, but, "...really? Do you think you could tell me?  I mean, explain it just like he would, imitate him a little?"
  A proud and slightly mischevious grin.  "Well, I'm sure it's a little impolite for me to do it, but Cook always laughs at the voices I can do, so since Master isn't here I guess I could a little bit."  He straightens his shoulders, and smooths down his shirt, as if it were a dress shirt beneath a jacket, rather than a loose peasant-style tunic. (I still wonder at the outfits I've seen him in - neither has at all suited the time period. But maybe it's a whim of Meres', to evoke other times and places by dressing his staff in costume from time to time? The kid has sure looked cute as hell both times I've seen him.)  He clears his throat, and makes a poor - though adorable - attempt at a lower-pitched voice.
  "Now, if you find yourself quite dry? Splendid. Do come with me, and I shall show you my private little palace."  He grins up at me, green eyes sparkling, and profers his arm.  I grin back and take it, letting him lead me back into the hallway.  He's... well, I'd say he's dropped some of his natural accent, but I'm not quite sure if he has.  The rhythm and flow of the words isn't quite American - and I know American would've sounded different a hundred-and-some years ago, but it's definitely more than that.  I can't place it though.
  "You've seen the kitchen, not much there of interest to the eyes, but you'll find yourself entirely surprised that the dinner we shall have for you came from such a small and common room.  Where a thing lacks in beauty to the eyes, it may have sufficient beauty to the other senses - and our cook is no exception to this."
  I'd tried so hard to burn Meres' words into my mind, when I heard him speak beside the fountain. "This is our garden, and we wish no-one to ever intrude upon our peace here."  I remember the words, and I imagine I can remember the tone, but, I know I've lost most of it.  It's so hard to keep a voice in your memory - the general pitches, maybe, but the timbre, the unique qualities and subtleties, they slip away so quickly.  I try to extrapolate from Jacob's exaggerations, and I think I can almost hear the candences he'd have.  It's hard to be sure, language of this time all sounds so formal and old-fashioned to me, but I think Meres' style is a little more florid, a little more extravagent...
  We've entered the music room.  Darnit, I'd stopped paying attention, but--- yes, alright, looking behind me, it looks like the passageway behind us would have led to the yellow entryway, we must be on the tower-side of the house.  It's such an unreal room - so striking in the photo I saw, it's much more so in person.  It's paint that makes up the patterns on the stone walls, panels of smooth clear light stone, and the patterning doesn't seem all that far off in style from the wallpaper I saw in Calvin's room.  Swirls and vines and flowers - and I grin to myself, knowing full well that each of the flowers included has a carefully considered meaning behind it.  The colors are rich and warm, contrasting the pale cool stone.
  Jacob's been talking, I tune back in as my eyes drink in the details of the carved wood ceiling, the patterned floor, the incredibly luxurious furniture in dark warm tones to match those on the walls.  "I must, I am sure, have told you what an exquisite musician Celestine is? It was that which first drew me to her, I can yet hear the sweetness of that melancholy air, each note shimmering in the air as diamonds strung beneath the summer sun..."  He stops a moment, and coughs a little, resuming his natural voice.  "He usually tells some other story then, but it's always a different one, full of odd names I've never heard of before."
  I smile, and pat the boy's shoulder. "That's fine! I can't believe how well you've memorized - I've only met your master once, but I'm quite sure you sound just like him."
Jacob beams, and the brightness of his eyes strikes me all over again.  He's such a little cherub of a boy!  ...well, no, not a cherub, because even as I think the word, he's scampered across the room and pulled a richly-decorated piece of fabric away from its place covering the piano I saw in the photo - at least, I'm assuming it's the same one, it's shaped like a grand piano but that's about as much as I know.  Though, that said, when I follow him into the room (treading so, so lightly and carefully on the inlaid floor), I'm totally unsurprised to see the name "Steinway & Sons" in gold lettering above the (presumably real ivory) keys.
  He smiles impishly at me and sits on the bench, with what I'm guessing is his attempt at a graceful motion, whirling the silken fabric around a bit as he does so.  Flourishing his hands in the air, he pauses for a moment over the keys, clearly debating whether or not to actually touch them.  Apparently remembering the napping cook, he decides on a visual rather than an attempt at an auditory impersonation, and moves his fingers quickly through the air up and down the keyboard.  And I'm pretty sure there's at least a little method to his motions, it's not totally random, so either he's watched his master play an awful lot, or he's had a little teaching himself.  (I find this indescribably odd - or, I would, were it anyone else's home.  In this kind of seclusion, and with his undoubtedly odd notions, I could imagine Meres ordering the boy dressed as a little Mozart for a party's entertainment.)
  "Do you recall the summer this song was composed? Ah, for the warm winds of Araby again!  The quiet here has helped to settle the storms that tore my heart when last we met, but there are times the silence leaves my ears ringing with sad echoes of more vivid days..."
  Jacob rattles this speech off in the same florid manner as the rest, as though describing a prized painting on a wall, but I think his imitation isn't as good as he believes it to be.  There is a mystery and longing in those words that no child so young could convey.  Araby?  Is that the accent, then?  It would certainly explain the Hebrew-looking book titles I saw in the library, if Meres is from somewhere in the Middle East.  But what strange path could have brought him from there to the middle of nowhere, North Carolina??
  "Now, shall I show you up to my library?  The stairway up through the tower was left open, so that when I've lost too many hours in the brittle ancient pages, my dear Celestine can play softly here, and recall me to myself again.   ...do, follow me, it's such a grand place you'll hardly believe it," Jacob gushes, at last breaking character as he grabs my hand.  I grin at his enthusiasm and, though I've seen the place before, I could spend years there and never be bored.  Alright, so that goes for every inch of this gorgeous place, but--
  "Ja-cob! How many times mus' I tell ye to latch that door behind ye?!"
  His green eyes go wide, and he bites his lip.  I'd expect him to look worried or afraid, but, no, he's grinning impishly.  "That rain must've blown the door back open. I do wish I'd have seen her face when she got woken by a big gust of cold water all over her!"
  I try hard not to laugh, but it doesn't really work, and Jacob would see through it anyway.  "Now, the parlor's just the next room there.  Caroline always makes the fire up about this time of day anyway, it'll be right cozy in there for you when she does."
  "Thanks," I start to reply, but he's already darted out of the room and out of sight.  I do look into the parlor, but it's much the same as it was when I last saw it.  A little brighter though - but then, everything's a decade or two newer now, and Evelyn did say her family had made some changes around the place.  The flowers are the main difference - there were flowers there in Evelyn's time too, but the arrangements were much more...ordinary? expected? almost perfunctory.  Today, there are flowers I can't name, and they're arranged with a much more sophisticated eye for color and texture and compliment and contrast...
  But I've hardly seen a thing of the other side of the house - and I'm really not likely to find photos of the master bedroom in the town hall of my own time!