He told us that it was just the house to suit us, and we should just suit the house. He said it was a mistake to suppose that a man who could manage one house could manage another. “There are men for houses and houses for men,” he said, “and this was the house for a quiet, energetic young couple, with taste and pleasing manners, and plenty of domestic management.”
It was nice of him—wasn’t it?—to say that, and he didn’t charge for it in the bill. He explained that it was a house which might easily be worked up into a little country hotel, if it had a good housewife to look after it; and Harry and I both felt that we really were lucky to get it, and we made up our minds to try and make it a nice, quiet hotel for London people, who wanted a few days in the country, to come and stay at.
I remember hearing my old master, Mr. Saxon, say how nice it was to know a really pretty country inn where one could have a room and breathe pure air for a few days, and eat simple food, and get away from the fog and the smoke, and feel truly rural.
“Harry,” I said, “as soon as we’re straight, and everything’s in order, I’ll write and let a lot of my old masters and mistresses know where I am. Perhaps with their recommendation we might get a nice little connection together for the hotel part. The local people will keep the bar going all right.”
“Yes,” said Harry, “that wouldn’t be a bad plan; and don’t you think that literary gentleman you lived with—the one that had the bad liver—might come, and recommend his friends? I should think it was just the house for a literary gentleman. Why, I believe I could write poetry here, myself.”
The dear old goose!—I should like to see his poetry. He’s always saying that some day he shall write his Memoirs, and then I shall be nowhere.
Oh dear, what fun it would be! But he wouldn’t have patience to go on long; he hates pens and ink.
But when he said about the literary people I didn’t answer all at once. I should like Mr. Saxon to come, but I don’t think I should like it to be a literary house altogether. Literary gentlemen are so queer in their ways, and they are not so particular as they might be with the ink, and they do burn the gas so late, and some of them smoke in bed; and there was another thing—if we had a lot of literary people down, they might get hold of the characters and the stories of the place, and then where would my book be?
So I said, “No, dear; I think we’ll ask Mr. Saxon to come, but we won’t try to get any more writers just yet. What we want are nice, quiet married couples and respectable elderly gentlemen—people who can appreciate peace and quietness, and won’t give much trouble.”
Ah me! when I think of the respectable elderly gentleman who did come, and then remember that I thought elderly respectable gentlemen were desirable guests, I feel inclined to——