I went on to assure them that I should have an
establishment quietly smart rather than noisily elegant, and that I
made no doubt the place would give a new tone to Red Gap, whereat they
all expressed themselves as immensely pleased, and our little
conference came to an end.
In company with Cousin Egbert I now went to examine the premises I was
to take over. There was a spacious corner room, lighted from the front
and side, which would adapt itself well to the decorative scheme I had
in mind. The kitchen with its ranges I found would be almost quite
suitable for my purpose, requiring but little alteration, but the
large room was of course atrociously impossible in the American
fashion, with unsightly walls, the floors covered with American cloth
of a garish pattern, and the small, oblong tables and flimsy chairs
vastly uninviting.
As to the gross ideals of the former tenant, I need only say that he
had made, as I now learned, a window display of foods, quite after the
manner of a draper's window: moulds of custard set in a row, flanked
on either side by "pies," as the natives call their tarts, with
perhaps a roast fowl or ham in the centre. Artistic vulgarity could of
course go little beyond this, but almost as offensive were the
abundant wall-placards pathetically remaining in place.
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