What a strange place! The salon in her momentary glance round it had seemed to her all splendour.

She had been dimly aware of pictures, fine hangings, luxurious carpets.

Here on the other hand all was rude and bare.

The stained walls were covered with a series of tattered daubs, that seemed to be meant for family portraits--of the Malestrini family perhaps, to whom the villa belonged?
And between the portraits there were rough modern doors everywhere of the commonest wood and manufacture which let in all the draughts, and made the room not a room, but a passage.

The uneven brick floor was covered in the centre with some thin and torn matting; many of the chairs ranged against the wall were broken; and the old lamp that swung above the table gave hardly any light.
Miss Manisty watched her guest's face with a look of amusement.
'Well, what do you think of our dining-room, my dear?
I wanted to clean it and put it in order.