When we had finished, Dr. Firth showed us all the quaint and beautiful things that his brother had collected. They were almost bewildering in their variety. One great room was given up to stuffed animals, far finer specimens than the moth-eaten relics to be found in the City Museum. There were marvellous cases of butterflies, mounted so exquisitely that they almost seemed in flight: others of tropical birds, and a particularly unpleasant section given up to reptiles, over which Judy and Jack gibbered with delight. In one room were weapons, ancient and modern, civilized and savage: in another, barbaric ornaments, set with rough jewels. I recollect a beautiful cabinet filled with fans, of the most delicate workmanship. So large was the collection that my brain was bewildered long before I had seen everything. I sympathized with Judy and Jack when at last they struck.
“They’re all awfully wonderful and all that,” Judy said bluntly. “But if you won’t think us rude, Dr. Firth, Jack and I would rather go back to the ponies!”
The Doctor laughed.
“I don’t blame you,” he said. “There is really too much for one day. I think Doris has had enough, too. Some other time you must come and see the rest: just now, I think we’ll lock them up again. Be off with you!”—and the pair raced away.
Dr. Firth returned the jewelled Tibetan belt-clasp he had been showing us to its blue-lined case, and locked the cabinet carefully.
“Mrs. McNab is convinced that the Wootong burglar will pay me a visit,” he said, laughing. “I don’t think so: these things are hardly likely to attract the average sneak-thief, though, of course, many of them are almost priceless. They really should not be in a private house. I mean to lend most of them to the Museum, and then I shan’t feel responsible.”
“I should love you to be burgled,” I said, laughing—“and the burglar to find himself inside that stuffed Zoo of yours. Just fancy the feelings of an enterprising thief who turned on his dark lantern and found himself confronted by a python! It would be enough to give him a change of heart, wouldn’t it?”
“It would certainly be worth seeing,” Dr. Firth agreed. “If he dropped his dark lantern in his confusion and couldn’t find the way out, there would be a very fair chance of adding a lunatic to the collection by the morning! That room is uncommonly eerie in a dim light. I don’t care for it myself. The animals always seem to me to come alive when the light begins to fade: sometimes you’d swear you saw one move. They say my brother used to sit there in the evening—he said the animals were companionable!”
“It was a queer taste,” I said.
“An unhealthy one, I think. No—they’re out of place in an ordinary man’s home. And the servants hate them; not one of the maids would go near that room after dark if you offered her double wages. That big room could be put to much better use than housing those silent avenues of watching beasts. It would make a fine ballroom, wouldn’t it, Doris?”