It was. Old Nurse had been in the habit of letting lodgings, till Father gave her the children to take care of. And her rooms were furnished “for letting”. Now it is a very odd thing that no one ever seems to furnish a room “for letting” in a bit the same way as one would furnish it for living in. This room had heavy dark red stuff curtains—the colour that blood would not make a stain on—with coarse lace curtains inside. The carpet was yellow, and violet, with bits of grey and brown oilcloth in odd places. The fireplace had shavings and tinsel in it. There was a very varnished mahogany chiffonier, or sideboard, with a lock that wouldn’t act. There were hard chairs—far too many of them—with crochet antimacassars slipping off their seats, all of which sloped the wrong way. The table wore a cloth of a cruel green colour with a yellow chain-stitch pattern round it. Over the fireplace was a looking-glass that made you look much uglier than you really were, however plain you might be to begin with. Then there was a mantelboard with maroon plush and wool fringe that did not match the plush; a dreary clock like a black marble tomb—it was silent as the grave too, for it had long since forgotten how to tick. And there were painted glass vases that never had any flowers in, and a painted tambourine that no one ever played, and painted brackets with nothing on them.
“And maple-framed engravings of the Queen, The Houses of Parliament, the Plains of Heaven, And of a blunt-nosed woodman’s flat return.”
There were two books—last December’s _Bradshaw_, and an odd volume of Plumridge’s _Commentary on Thessalonians_. There were—but I cannot dwell longer on this painful picture. It was indeed, as Jane said, very different.
“Let’s have a palaver,” said Anthea again.
“There’s nothing to have _anything_ about,” said Robert kicking the leg of the table miserably.
“I don’t want to play,” said Jane, and her tone was grumpy.
Anthea tried very hard not to be cross. She succeeded.
“Look here,” she said, “don’t think I want to be preachy or a beast in any way, but I want to what Father calls define the situation. Do you agree?”
“Fire ahead,” said Cyril without enthusiasm.
“Well then. We all know the reason we’re staying here is because Nurse couldn’t leave her house on account of the poor learned gentleman on the top-floor. And there was no one else Father could entrust to take care of us—and you know it’s taken a lot of money, Mother’s going to Madeira to be made well.”