“They’ll be all right when they are played on for some time,” said Guy.
“Oh, yes; in a year or two they’ll be like butter,” said Pierce encouragingly. “Your light wasn’t particularly good I should say?”
He pointed to a splash of wax about the size of a crown piece on the edge of one of the pockets.
“That chap is a regular Sherlock Holmes,” cried Guy. “He has found out that we played by the light of candles last night.”
On the shelf of the mantelpiece stood a pair of silver candelabra with remnants of candle still in the sockets, but a good bit out of the upright. Splashes of wax decorated the path from the billiard-table to the fireplace, suggesting the white stones alongside a carriage drive.
“Only one cue had a tip,” said Guy. “That made playing a bit tiresome: you see we had to pass it on for every stroke. We had best go on to the drawing-room. The ceiling is said to have been painted by Angelica Kauffmann—whoever she was.”
“I never saw a painted ceiling that poor Miss Angel hadn’t something to say to,” whispered Josephine as the party trooped through the open door.
It was as Lady Severn had said: the drawing-room stood sadly in need of dusting.
So, for that matter, did every other room, to say nothing of the stairs which were carpetless. The house was not quite a wreck; but one felt oneself instinctively quoting lines from Tennyson’s “Mariana” as one stood—it was scarcely safe to sit—in any of the rooms. There were bald patches upon some of the walls that had some time—long ago—been painted; but as a sort of compensation for this deficiency, as a member of the party remarked when it was pointed out to him there were several patches on the wall that were not bald but quite the contrary; for indeed the mildew had been at work increasing the forlorn appearance of the place.
But the new proprietor was very proud of everything—of the patches on the wall that marked where the plaster had become dislodged—of the hirsute patches that had been subject to the damp—of the bullet marks that he considered the visible signs of the duel fought with swords—nay, even of the rat that went scurrying across a room which he called the library, the moment the door was opened. Oh, there were plenty of rats, he declared—some fine fat healthy animals; he talked of them as though they were part of the live stock of the estate.