“Your arguments are good, very good,” admitted Anthony; “so good that I’d like to put you on your mettle to draw me a set of plans for just the sort of thing you think I ought to have—or Mrs. Robeson ought to have, for she’s the one to be considered. Anything will do for me. I’ll let you do this—on one condition.”
“Name it.”
“That you also do your level best to demonstrate to me what a clever man and an artist of your proportions could make out of this house, provided he really wanted to show the extent of his ability. Now, that’s fair. If you really care to convince me you won’t fool with this proposition, you’ll make a study of the one problem as thoroughly as you do of the other, and let me decide the case on its merits. If I thought you weren’t giving the old house a fair chance I should take up its cause out of pure affection.”
He smiled at Cathcart’s discontented face with so brilliant a good humour that the architect cleared up.
“By Jove, Robeson,” he said, “I think I see what endears you to the Hendersons. I wouldn’t have said you could have induced me to try my hand at the old house, but I’ll be hanged if I don’t follow your instructions to the letter—and win out, too.”
“Good,” said Anthony. “And don’t mention it to my wife. We’ll keep it for a surprise; and I promise you when the time comes I won’t prejudice her in any way.”
Cathcart drew out a notebook and pencil and entered some memoranda on the spot, while Anthony, coming up on the piazza of the dining-room, laid upon the old Dutch house-door a hand which seemed to caress it. He was wondering if by any possible magic Cathcart could create, in the rarest abode in the world, a new door which he should ever care to enter as he now cared to enter this.
“I think,” said Juliet decidedly, “you’re wrong about it.”
“And I know,” returned Anthony with emphasis, “that you are.”