Doomsday by Warwick Deeping

-"Hill House" was the only old building in the Hills, and Percival Fream lived in it.

Built somewhere about the end of the eighteenth century, its grey facade looked across a terrace towards a piece of parkland that still held the barbarians at a distance. The house had long windows, a balustraded parapet, and an Ionic portico jutting out with unconvincing shallowness over its big central doorway. There were those who compared the rather expressionless flatness of the house to its owner's face, but like Fream it had a grey "presence," a constrained dignity. In old Weyfleet it had been spoken of always as the "House," just as its owner was referred to as Mr. Fream, or perhaps as Mr. Percival Fream. No one ever "Percied" him. An irreverent person had referred to him on a pantomimic occasion as "Pallid, pontifical Percy," but affectionate diminutives were not thrown in his face. He was Mr. Fream of Hill House. "Sir Percival--some day--my dear," was a prophecy thrown out by Clare Biddulph, and a hint that somebody might yet be Lady Fream.