Part 44

"You may try to disguise it," she complained, "but I've known you too long not to be able to read you. You would rather have had me cook that dinner myself and bring it in, all red and blistered from being over the stove."

"As long as the dinner wasn't red and blistered you wouldn't have been unhappy," Juliet returned lightly. "But you mustn't think that she who entertains may read my ingenuous face, my dear. It isn't necessary that I attempt to convert the world to my way of thinking. And I haven't told you that when Auntie Dingley goes abroad with father again this winter I'm to have Mary McKaim for eight whole months. I can assure you I know how to appreciate the comfort of having a competent cook in the kitchen."

She got up and crossed the room. "Judith, what an exquisite lamp," she observed. "I'd forgotten that you had it. Was it one of your wedding presents?"

Judith followed her to where she stood examining an imposing, foreign-looking lamp, with jeweled inlets in the hand-wrought metal shade. "Yes," she said carelessly, "it's pretty enough. I don't care much for lamps."

"Not to read by?"

"It's bright enough for anybody but a blind man to read, here." Judith glanced at the ornate chandelier of electric lights in the centre of the ceiling. "The rooms aren't so high that the lights are out of reach for reading."

"But this is beautiful. Have you never used it?"

"It might be used with an electric connection, I suppose. No, I've never used it as an oil lamp. I hate kerosene oil."

"But you have some in the house?"

"Oh, yes, I think so. Wayne insisted on getting some little hand-lamps. Something's always happening to the wires out here. That's one of the numerous joys of living in the suburbs."

"Let's fill this and try it," Juliet suggested, turning a pair of very bright eyes upon her friend. "If you've never lit it I don't believe you've half appreciated it. You're neglecting one of the prettiest sources of decoration you have in the house. Out of sympathy for the giver, whoever he was, you ought to let his gift have a chance to show you its beauty."

"Stevens Cathcart gave it to us, I believe," said Judith. "Here, let me have it. I'll fill it, since you insist. But I never thought very much of it. It was put away in a closet until we came here. It took up so much room I never found a place for it."

"Mr. Cathcart gave it to you? That proves my point, that it's worth admiring. If there's a connoisseur in things of this sort, it's he. He probably picked it up in some out-of-the-ordinary European shop."

Smiling to herself, as if something gave her satisfaction, Juliet awaited the return of her hostess. She understood, from the manner of Judith's exit with the lamp, that the free and easy familiarity with which guests invaded every portion of Anthony's little home, was not to be made a precedent for the same sort of thing in Judith's.

The lamp reappeared, accompanied by a lamentation over the disagreeable qualities of kerosene oil for any use whatever.

"You can put electricity into this and use it as a drop-light, if you prefer," said Juliet, as she lit it and adjusted the shade. "May I set it on the big table over here? Right in the center, please, if you don't mind moving that bowl of carnations. There!--Of course you can send it back to oblivion over there on the bookcase if you really don't like it.--But you do like it--don't you?"

"It's handsomer than I thought it was," Judith admitted without enthusiasm. Juliet glanced up at the blazing chandelier overhead.

"May I turn off some of this light?" she asked. "You won't get the full beauty of your lamp till you give it a chance by itself."

Judith assented. Juliet snapped off three out of the four lights, and smiled mischievously at her friend. Then she extinguished the fourth, so that the only luminary left in the room was the lamp. Judith groaned.

"Maybe you like a gloomy room like this. I don't. Look at it. I can hardly see anything in the corners."

"Wait a little bit. You're so used to the glare your eyes are not good for seeing what I mean. Study the lamp itself a minute. Did you ever see anything so fascinating as the gleam through those jewels? An electric bulb inside would add to the brilliancy, though it's not so soft a light to read by, and the effect in the room isn't so warm. Observe those carnations under the lamplight, honey? Come over here to the doorway and look at your whole room under these new conditions. Isn't it charming?--enticing?--Let's draw that lovely Morris chair up close to the table, as if you were expecting Wayne to come in and read the evening paper by the lamp. There!"

Juliet softly clapped her hands, her face shining with friendly enthusiasm. There could be no question that the whole room, as she had said, had taken on a new look of homelike comfort and cheer which it had lacked before. Even Judith was forced to see it.

"It looks very well," she admitted. "But I should have more light from above. I like plenty of light."

"So do I, if you manage it well." Whereupon the guest, having gained her point and made sufficient demonstration of it, turned the conversation into other channels. But the lamp was not yet through with its position of reformer. The two men, having finished their cigars, and hearing sounds of merriment from the adjoining room, came strolling in. Anthony, comprehending at a glance the change which had come over the aspect of the room and the cause thereof, advanced, smiling. But Carey came to a standstill upon the threshold, his lips drawn into an astonished whistle.

"What's happened?" he ejaculated, and stood staring.

"Do you like it?" asked his wife.

"I should say I did. But what's done it? What makes the room look so different? It looks--why it looks like your rooms!" he cried, gazing at Anthony.

"He can say nothing more flattering than that," said Judith, evidently not altogether pleased. "It's the highest compliment he knows."