There certainly
was an atmosphere about it, and I felt too that Father Payne, for all his
easiness, had somehow got the reins in his hands.
The next morning I went down to breakfast, which was, I found, like
breakfast at a club, as Vincent had said. It was a plain meal--cold bacon,
a vast dish of scrambled eggs kept hot by a spirit lamp and a hot-water
arrangement. You could make toast for yourself if you wished, and there was
a big fresh loaf, with excellent butter, marmalade, and jam--not an ascetic
breakfast at all. There were daily papers on the table, and no one talked.
I did not see Father Payne, who must have come in later.
After breakfast, Barthrop showed me the rooms of the house. The library was
fitted up with bookshelves and easy-chairs for reading, with a big round
oak table in the centre. The floor was of stained oak boards and covered
with rugs. There was also a capacious smoking-room, and I learned that
smoking was not allowed elsewhere. It was, in fact, a solid old family
mansion of some dignity. There were three or four oil paintings in all the
rooms, portraits and landscapes. The general tone of decoration was
dark--red wall-papers and fittings stained brown. It was all clean and
simple, and there was a total absence of ornament, I went and walked in the
garden, which was of the same very straightforward kind--plain grass,
shrubberies, winding paths, with comfortable wooden seats in sheltered
places; one or two big beds, evidently of old-fashioned perennials, and
some trellises for ramblers.
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