The Enigma of the Old Manor House — 10 of 28

Part Huge Room

The Huge Room is a room. "High and wide and rectangular, big enough that you can hear your footsteps echo back and forth off the walls. It's grand and impressive and makes you feel very small and very much alone. [if there should not be light]You can barely make out anything in the gloom, and more than once you bang your shin on some piece of furniture as you try to navigate through it[else if the breaker panel is switched on]It really seems like it [i]deserves[/i] a chandelier, or several chandeliers, but instead it's lit by a dozen little spotlights shining down from the edges of the ceiling, revealing piles of sheet-covered furniture and long streaks and scuff marks in the wooden floor[else]Your lantern makes a little pool of light around you, but everything past that is lost in darkness; the furniture looms gray and ghostly at the edges of your vision[end if]."

Understand "play [something]" as attacking.

A grand piano is fixed in place in the Huge Room. The initial appearance is "A grand piano stands proudly off to one side." It is a container. It is lightbound, closed, and locked. The tiny silver key unlocks it. The description of the piano is "It's the one piece of furniture here that's not covered with a sheet, maybe because it's already got a cover built into it. It's [if closed]shut tight, with both the strings and the keys hidden away[else]now been opened up to the dusty air[end if]." Understand "cover" as the grand piano.

Instead of opening the locked grand piano: say "It doesn't budge. Looking closer, there's a little silver keyhole on the key cover."

Some piano-keys are fixed in place in the grand piano. The printed name is "keys". Understand "keys" or "ivory" or "ivories" as the piano-keys. The description is "Are these actual ivory?". Instead of pushing or pulling or attacking the piano-keys: say "You play a few notes. It's horrifically out of tune."

Some strings are fixed in place in the grand piano. The description is "They're a lot less dusty than everything else in this house." Instead of pushing or pulling or turning the strings: say "Even if you knew how to tune a piano, you don't have the equipment."

Instead of attacking the closed piano: say "It's closed."

Instead of attacking the open piano: try attacking the piano-keys.

Instead of attacking the strings: try attacking the piano-keys.

A mess of toppled furniture is a lightbound hazard in the Huge Room. "Furniture has been stacked haphazardly all over the room[if uncleared], and some of these stacks have toppled over, turning the east side of the room into an obstacle course and half-blocking the door[else], though you've managed to clear a path through the mess[end if]." Understand "obstacle" and "course" and "stacks" and "stack" as the mess of toppled furniture.

Instead of pushing the mess of toppled furniture:

if the noun is uncleared:

say "You do your best to drag some of the pieces away from the door, making a path through the mess.";

now the noun is cleared;

now the jam1 is unjammed;

otherwise:

say "You haul a couple more pieces around, but it barely makes an impact on the mess."