They sat down to luncheon. The dining-room, like every other part of the small house, had been beautified as much as its position and dimensions would allow. It had originally been small, but an extension of glass had been built out into the yard, which Hester had turned into a fernery. There were a great number of plants of many varieties, some of which had been obtained with great difficulty from immense distances. Hester had been told that it would be impossible to make them grow in an inhabited room, but she had succeeded, and the result was something altogether out of the common.
She admitted that, besides the attention she bestowed upon the plants herself, they occupied the whole time of a specially trained gardener. They were her only hobby, and where they were concerned, time and money had no value for her. The dining-room itself was simple, but exquisite in its way. There were a few pieces of wonderfully chiselled silver on the sideboard, and the glasses on the table were Venetian and Bohemian, and very old. The linen was as fine as fine writing paper, the porcelain was plain white Sèvres. There was nothing superfluous, but there were all the little, unobtrusive, almost priceless details which are the highest expression “of intimate luxury—in which the eye alone receives rest, while the other senses are flattered to the utmost. Colour and the precious metals are terribly cheap things nowadays compared with what appeals to touch and taste. There are times when certain dainties, like terrapin, for instance, are certainly worth much more than their weight in silver, if not quite their weight in gold. But as for that, to say that a man is worth his weight in gold has ceased to mean very much. Some ingenious persons have lately calculated that the average man’s weight in gold would be worth about forty thousand dollars, and that a few minutes’ worth of the income of some men living would pay for a life-sized golden calf. The further development of luxury will be an interesting thing to watch during the next century. A poor woman in New York recently returned a roast turkey to a charitable lady who had sent it to her, with the remark that she was accustomed to eat roast beef at Christmas, though she ‘did not mind turkey on Thanksgiving Day.’
Katharine wondered how far such a man as Griggs, who said that he hated music, could appreciate the excessive refinement of a luxury which could be felt rather than seen. It was all familiar to Katharine, and there were little things at the Crowdies which she longed to have at home. Griggs ate his oysters in silence. Fletcher came to his elbow with a decanter.
“Vin de Grave, sir?” enquired the old butler in a low voice.
“No wine, thank you,” said Griggs.
“There’s Sauterne, isn’t there, Walter?” asked Hester. “Perhaps Mr. Griggs—”
“Griggs is a cold water man, like me,” answered Crowdie. “His secret vice is to drink a bucket of it, when nobody is looking.”
Fletcher looked disappointed, and replaced the decanter on the sideboard.
“It’s uncommon to see two men who drink nothing,” observed Hester. “But I remember that Mr. Griggs never did.”
“Never—since you knew me, Mrs. Crowdie. I did when I was younger.”