"
"It is getting rather chilly," said Mrs. Parker.
"Perhaps we had better go down now, then," Miss Ormiston said. "Mr.
Forrester, would you come out of your brown study and let us pass?"
"Certainly. I'll see you all safe off the battlements. I wasn't in a
brown study: I was in a mist."
"Then take care: people in a mist always think they are going the
right way when they are going directly wrong."
"If I only knew the right way!" he said.
"That's true, Mr. Forrester," said Mrs. Parker. "If we only knew the
right way; and people tell you to be guided by Providence, but I say
I never know when it is Providence and when it is myself;" and she
threaded her way down the narrow stairs, followed by the rest of the
party.
III.
The dining-room, with its low roof, its crimson walls, dark furniture
and handsome fire (the fires at Cockhoolet were always handsome:
Bessie was the architect and superintended the building herself; they
never looked harum-scarum nor meaningless nor thoughtless, nor as if
they were not meant to burn; they combined taste, comfort, and, as a
consequence, economy; everything tasteful and comfortable is in the
long run economical), its table-cloth, glistening like the summit of
the Alps and laden with good things, looked a place where people even
not in love with each other might, unless naturally perverse, be very
happy.
Mrs. Parker, being from town, was in raptures with every country
eatable, especially the scones, which she found were manufactured by
Miss Ormiston herself.
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