On the way back to the salon the ladies passed once more through the large book-room or library which lay between it and the dining-room.

Lucy Foster looked round it, a little piteously, as though she were seeking for something to undo the impression--the disappointment--she had just received.
'Oh! my dear, you never saw such a place as it was when we arrived in March'-- said Miss Manisty.

'It was the billiard-room--a ridiculous table--and ridiculous balls--and a tiled floor without a scrap of carpet--and the _cold_! In the whole apartment there were just two bedrooms with fireplaces.

Eleanor went to bed in one; I went to bed in the other.
No carpets--no stoves--no proper beds even.

Edward of course said it was all charming, and the climate balmy.