The Happy Garden 



good for chimneys to go crooked ; so this one goes 

 to the right, and interferes with nothing, though 

 perhaps it makes the wall a little too hot for the 

 books. The little window looks on to the passage. 

 Stand on the hearth, Jane, and look through it, 

 and I will show you something more than a white 

 door and wall as a background to " Victory." 



Jane stands on the hearth, on tiptoe, for she is 

 very short, and her funny little face peers through 

 the window at me with childish wonder and expect- 

 ancy in her eyes. I open the door of the little mauve 

 spare room, and her mouth forms a round O as 

 she gazes through the room and out over the apple 

 trees and flower border into the woods. Suddenly 

 she disappears, and comes round to join me in 

 raptures over the deep mauve carpet and the chintz 

 with its mauve roses, and the Japanese prints on 

 the white walls, and the Queen Anne furniture, and 

 the peep of the gardener's absurd little doll's house, 

 and the view along the drive up to the garage and 

 the fruit garden. 



It is a perfect little nest for Jane, and she says 

 so. She shall have a volume of Nietzsche, and she 

 shall sleep there between the chapters. . . . She 

 will be no trouble to the servants. 



She is as curious about the doors in the passage 

 as the wives of Bluebeard. 



38 



