The eminent architect, a man of some humour, had remarked to him when he laid before him the plans, “Most men, Baron, when they build houses, build them too small; afterwards they have to enlarge. I have made ample provision here for another wing, if it should be required. It will not destroy the general scheme of the structure.”
Of course, when the eminent architect made this suggestion, Salmoros was comparatively a young man. He might marry and want to put aside suites of rooms for his sons and daughters. The eminent architect had this in his eye when he suggested the possibility of another wing.
Salmoros had agreed, but the other wing had never been built. He had not married, and the house as it stood was spacious enough for his wants.
Here he stored his valuable pictures, his rare china, his costly antiques. His gardens were the best laid-out in England, his rock walk was not to be equalled in the kingdom, his hot-houses were the pride of the county.
Everything that money could purchase was his, not from a mere common love of display, but that he would have everything of the best—cellars stocked with the finest wines, cabinets filled with the most choice cigars. A week-end with Salmoros was to the bon viveur a period of ecstasy. Everything in that well-appointed ménage was perfect.
Even Nada, accustomed to the splendours of the Zouroff Palace, was a little overwhelmed by the stately magnificence of the great financier. Corsini, of humble extraction, was fairly dazzled by it.
“We seem to walk on velvet, darling, don’t we?” he whispered to his wife as they went down the great staircase. “If we could only have a little music, we might think we were in Paradise.”
But the Baron had provided for that. There were no other guests during the week-end. With the whim of an old man he had wanted to have them to himself.
During the perfect dinner, prepared by a chef to whom he paid an enormous salary, a small orchestra played some exquisite music, so softly rendered that it did not interfere with conversation. Salmoros thought out all these things with the true spirit of the artist—the artist with perhaps, in his complex spirit, a little of the Oriental.
Nada was enchanted. What seemed barbarous in Russia was here touched with refinement, a different thing altogether. What a wonderful old man he was!