It was, "_Be it ever so humble_," again.
The rooms were very elaborately furnished; the hangings were heavy and
sumptuous. A massive oak mantelpiece harboured a fire of gas-logs.
There were a few--not many--apparently personal belongings about the
rooms; _bric-a-brac_ and photographs--the latter mostly of actors and
opera singers. In Althea's bedroom we came upon a dressing-table which
reminded me of my own, upon the occasion of Althea's visit to me, a few
years before. Althea calmly stirred over everything upon it in the
effort to find a small jewel-case whose contents she wished to show me.
She found it in the end, although for a time the task seemed hopeless.
We sat down in the outer room and listened again to the Promoter's tales
of the great strokes of business he had brought off--"deals," he called
them. The stories contained much food for thought in the shape of
revelations of character in this or that man of prominence. What we
should have talked about if he had not thus held the floor I could not
guess.
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