The young wife smiled gratefully upon her husband, and then looked around with child-like interest.
They stood in a cheerful little hall, illuminated by an antique lamp in a stained glass shade, that shed myriads of prismatic hues over the white and gilded wall and richly-carpeted floor. It was a hexagon-shaped hall, with a staircase opposite the front door, and with four other doors, two on each side, opening into the drawing-room and dining-room on the right, and the parlor and library on the left.
“This is your little maid, Pina, my dear, and she will show you to your room, if you please,” said Alexander.
Drusilla turned and smiled kindly on the bright-eyed negro girl, who took up a wax candle, and stood curtseying and waiting orders.
“Go on then, Pina, and lead the way; I will follow,” said Drusilla.
And Alexander placed the carpet bag that contained all the bride’s trousseau in the hands of the girl, who, with another curtsey, turned and led the way up stairs to an upper hexagon-shaped hall, with a bay window in the front end, and four doors, two on each side, leading into bedrooms and dressing-rooms.
Pina opened the front door on the right hand.
“Oh, what a sweet, what a pretty, what a delightful little room!” exclaimed Drusilla, on passing the threshold.
The room deserved her praise. It had been designed by the hands of love to please the eyes of beauty. Its colors were white and rose. The walls were hung with a paper of a white ground, with a running vine of wild roses over it. The floor was covered with a carpet white with the same patterns of wild roses running over it. The windows were curtained with white lace, lined with rose-colored silk. The dressing-table that stood between the windows was draped to match them, in white lace over rose silk. The bed was spread with a white crochet counterpane, lined with rose satin. The chairs and sofas were covered with white damask embroidered in roses. All the little stands and tables were in white and rose enamel.
It was a chamber to delight a child or a young girl. To crown all, a clear, bright wood-fire was burning on the white marble hearth.