Rotha was silent a while.
"Well!" she said at last, "I see now that the furnishing of a house has more meaning in it than ever I thought."
"You see, I hope also," Mr. Southwode said gently, "that your conditions of comfort and prettiness and pleasantness are not excluded?"
"I suppose not," said Rotha, thinking busily. "The house would do its work better, even its work among these people you have been speaking of,—far better, for being pretty and comfortable and pleasant. I see that. Refinement is not excluded, only luxury."
"Say, only useless luxury."
"Yes, I see that," said Rotha.
"Then the Bible bids us use hospitality without grudging. That is, welcoming to the shelter and comfort of our houses any who at any time may need it. Tired people, homeless people, ailing people, poor people. So the house and the table must be always ready to receive and welcome new guests."
"I see it all, Mr. Digby," said Rotha, lifting her eyes to him.
"There is no finery at Southwode—I might say, nothing fine; there are some things valuable. But the house seems to me to want nothing that the most refined taste can desire. I think you will like it."
"I think I understand the whole scheme of life, as you put it," Rotha went on, shyly getting away from the personal to the abstract. "So far as things can be done, things enjoyed,—books and music and everything,—by a servant of Christ who is always doing his Master's work; so far as they would not hinder but help the work and him; so far you would use them, and there stop."