He felt it almost as a dishonour to have strangers using this furniture, sitting in the great leather chair in which the Old Gentleman had died, staring stupidly at his Renaissance portraits and copies of Assyrian _bas-reliefs_.

Above all, it was torture to think that other hands than his own would tend the famous tiled and flamboyant stove, a stove that had its moods, its caprices, like any living person, a stove that had to be coaxed and humoured, a stove that he alone could understand.

He had told himself that if ever again he should have money enough he would bring back this furniture to him.

At first its absence had been a matter for the keenest regret and grief.

He had been so used to pleasant surroundings that he languished in his new quarters as in a prison.