slight mist. He hardened. The idea of her indicating houses to him! The
idea of her assuming that----Well, no use in meeting trouble half-way!




CHAPTER XVI

THE HALL AND ITS RESULT


"Yes," said Mrs. Prockter, gazing about her, to James Ollerenshaw, "it
certainly is rather spacious."

"Rather spacious!" James repeated in the secret hollows of his mind. It
was not spacious; it was simply fantastic. They stood, those two--Mrs.
Prockter in her usual flowered silk, and James in his usual hard,
rent-collecting clothes--at the foot of the double staircase, which
sprang with the light of elegance of wings from the floor of the
entrance-hall of Wilbraham Hall. In front of them, over the great door,
was a musicians' gallery, and over that a huge window. On either side of
the great door were narrow windows which looked over stretches of green
country far away from the Five Towns. For Wilbraham Hall was on the
supreme ridge of Hillport, and presented only its back yard, so to
speak, to the Five Towns. And though the carpets were rolled up and tied
with strings, and though there were dark rectangular spaces on the walls
showing where pictures had been, the effect of the hall was quite a
furnished effect. Polished oak and tasselled hangings, and monstrous
vases and couches and chairs preserved in it the appearance of a home,
if a home of giants.