“Thank you, love,” said Rosa; “now I know what to do; I'll not forget a word. And the train so beautifully shaped! Ah! it is only in London or Paris they can make a dress flow behind like that,” etc., etc.
Dr. Staines came back to dinner in good spirits; he had found a house in Harewood Square; good entrance hall, where his gratuitous patients might sit on benches; good dining-room where his superior patients might wait; and good library, to be used as a consulting-room. Rent only eighty-five pounds per annum.
But Rosa told him that would never do; a physician must be in the fashionable part of the town.
“Eventually,” said Christopher; “but surely at first starting—and you know they say little boats should not go too far from shore.”
Then Rosa repeated all her friend's arguments, and seemed so unhappy at the idea of not living near her, that Staines, who had not yet said the hard word “no” to her, gave in; consoling his prudence with the reflection that, after all, Mr. Cole could put many a guinea in his way, for Mr. Cole was middle-aged,—though his wife was young,—and had really a very large practice.
So next day, the newly-wedded pair called on a house-agent in Mayfair, and his son and partner went with them to several places. The rents of houses equal to that in Harewood Square were three hundred pounds a year at least, and a premium to boot.
Christopher told him these were quite beyond the mark. “Very well,” said the agent. “Then I'll show you a Bijou.”
Rosa clapped her hands. “That is the thing for us. We don't want a large house, only a beautiful one, and in Mayfair.”
“Then the Bijou will be sure to suit you.”
He took them to the Bijou.