She threw back her head and looked at him. “I ask you, Merle. Will you come and live here?”
“Do you want me to answer this moment, on the spot?”
“Yes. For I want to buy it this moment, on the spot.”
“Well, aren’t you—”
“Look, Merle, just look at it all. That long balcony there, with the doric columns—nothing shoddy about that—it’s the real thing. Empire. I know something about it.”
“But it’ll cost a great deal, Peer.” There was some reluctance in her voice. Was she thinking of her violin? Was she loth to take root too firmly?
“A great deal?” he said. “What did your father give for it?”
“The place was sold by auction, and he got it cheap. Fifty thousand crowns, I think it was.”
Peer strode off towards the house again. “We’ll buy it. It’s the very place to make into a home. . . . Horses, cattle, sheep, goats, cottars—ah! it’ll be grand.”
Merle followed him more slowly. “But, Peer, remember you’ve just taken over father’s machine-shops in town.”