They
passed through corridors, and up and down short or long stairways, with
stained or faded walls, and sometimes with cracked or fallen plastering
and wainscotting. Here and there the oak flooring itself was uncertain.
The rooms, whether large or small, all presented a like aspect of
potential beauty and comfort, utterly uncared for and forlorn. There
were many rooms, but none more than scantily furnished, and a number of
them were stripped bare. Betty found herself wondering how long a time
it had taken the belongings of the big place to dwindle and melt away
into such bareness.
"There was a time, I suppose, when it was all furnished," she said.
"All these rooms were shut up when I came here," Rosy answered. "I
suppose things worth selling have been sold. When pieces of furniture
were broken in one part of the house, they were replaced by things
brought from another. No one cared. Nigel hates it all. He calls it a
rathole. He detests the country everywhere, but particularly this part
of it. After the first year I had learned better than to speak to him of
spending money on repairs."
"A good deal of money should be spent on repairs," reflected Betty,
looking about her.
She was standing in the middle of a room whose walls were hung with
the remains of what had been chintz, covered with a pattern of loose
clusters of moss rosebuds.
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