“Oh, a fireplace!”
“Oh, a window-seat!”
“Two window-seats!”
These exclamations fell swiftly and explosively from the lips of Dotty Rose and Dolly Fayre, as they leaned over the table at which Mr. Rose was drawing plans.
And such plans! And for such a purpose! Why, the whole project was nothing more nor less than a house, a real little house for those two fortunate girls! All their own, with fireplaces and window-seats and goodness knows what all delightful contrivances.
It had come about because of the fact that the girls had to study pretty hard, now that they were in High School, and both found difficulty in finding just the right place to study. Dolly declared that Trudy was always having company, and the laughter and chatter was so permeating, she couldn’t find a place in the house to get out of hearing the noise. While Dotty said little Genie was always carrying on with her young playmates, or else Mother and Aunt Clara were having Sewing Society or something, and she never could be quiet in the library. The girls, of course, had their own bedrooms, but both mothers objected, on hygienic grounds, to using those for sitting-rooms.
So Mr. Rose had cooked up a most fascinating scheme, and after a discussion with Mr. Fayre, he elucidated it to the girls. It seemed Mr. Fayre fully approved of it, and was quite willing to pay his share of the expense, but he was too busy to look after the details of building, and begged Mr. Rose to attend to all that.
Mr. Rose, who was cashier of the Berwick Bank, had plenty of leisure time, and, moreover, had a taste for architecture, so the plans were in process of drafting. As the house was to be exceedingly simple, he felt he could plan it all himself, and thus save the expense of an architect.
“You see,” he said to his interested audience, “it is really nothing but a summer house, only it is enclosed, so as to be—”
“A winter-house!” interrupted Dotty. “Oh, Daddy, it is too perfectly scrumptiousiferous! I don’t see how I can live through such joy!”