IV Vine Cottage
I
The cottage had been vacant almost four months, an economic waste that cut deeply into Lavinia Trench’s pin-money. Not that David stinted her in the matter of funds. The purse strings had always lain loosely in David’s hands. But her penurious soul, bent on making the best possible showing of whatever resources came within her reach, rebelled at the insolent idleness of invested capital. Vine Cottage had been hers, to do with as she pleased, since the completion of the big Colonial mansion that housed the remnant of the Trench family. There were not half-a-dozen furnished residences to let in Springdale, and that this one should have been unoccupied since the middle of November was inexplicable.
“You haven’t half way tried to rent it,” the woman charged, her eyes shifting from her husband’s face to the cottage beyond the low stone wall, with its sullenly drawn blinds and its air of insensate content. Her glance rested appraisingly on the broad veranda, now banked with wet February snow; the little glass-enclosed breakfast room that had been her own conservatory, in the years gone by; the sturdy-throated chimney, that would never draw—but that none the less served as one of the important talking points of the cottage. An attractive set of gas logs did away with the danger of stale wood smoke in the library; but the chimney remained—moss-covered at the corners, near the ground, a hardy ampelopsis tracing a pattern of brown lace against its dull red bricks. There were eight rooms and a capacious attic. The furniture was excellent. There was a garage, too, with living quarters for the servants. In the year of grace, nineteen hundred and nine, there were not many residences in Springdale with garages.
“I heard at church, Sunday, that Mrs. Marksley is looking for a house. You know, Vine, their place on Grant Drive is for sale—against the building of the new house in Marksley’s Addition. Do you want me to—”
“Mrs. Marksley! Humph!” Lavinia’s black eyes snapped. It would be to her liking to have the wife of the richest man in town as her tenant. Still ... the situation had its disadvantages, not the least of which was that they would be moving out again in a few months, and the same old problem to be faced afresh.
“Do as you like about speaking to Mr. Marksley. But remember, David, I don’t recommend it.”
“It’s your house, my dear. You blamed me for offering the place to Sylvia when she was married. I told you, last fall, I’d have nothing more to do with it.”