“Will you please go out and ascertain if the Priory is still to let?”
“The Priory! Are you mad, child?”
“No, I assure you I am quite sane. The Priory is a very pleasant sunny house, beautifully furnished. The Ashtons only left it a week ago. If it is still to let, please take it without a moment’s delay. It is not the least matter about the price. It faces due south, and has a lovely garden. I think we may be able to remove my mother there to-morrow.”
Chapter Twenty Two.
Tell him to come to see me.
The Priory was taken, and in less than twenty-four hours, my mother found herself the occupant of a large, luxuriously-furnished chamber. Her windows commanded an extensive and most lovely view. She had a glimpse of the winding river which made our little village a favourite summer resort for anglers. It meandered away like a narrow silver thread in the midst of the peaceful landscape. Already there was a faint tinge of soft, pale green on the trees, and an added brightness was making the grass beautiful with a fresh growth. The Priory had sloping lawns, flower-beds carefully tended and gay with all the early spring flowers. There were greenhouses in abundance; there were gravel-walks and tennis-courts; in short, the usual pleasure-grounds which surround a country home of some pretension.
Inside the appointments were perfect. An able staff of servants attended to our every want. There were suites of beautiful rooms, bright, and gay, and clean. Fresh air and sweetness pervaded everything. In short, there could scarcely have been found a greater contrast than Myrtle Cottage, where the Lindley family had resided for so many years, and the Priory, where that same family now enjoyed the pleasures of refined existence.
It is surprising how soon one gets accustomed to luxury. My father and brother, who began by accepting the good things of life with a humility almost painful to witness, before a week was out grumbled about the quality of the soup served at dinner, and expressed in plaintive tones their dislike to turbot appearing too often on the board.