Linda conceived it was her womanly mission to lighten the severity of Michael's choice in furniture and decorations.

She introduced rickety and expensive screens that were easily knocked over; photographs in frames which toppled at a breath; covers on every flat surface that could be covered--occasional tables, tops of grand pianos.

If she did not put frills round piano legs, she placed tasselled poufs about the drawing-room that every short-sighted visitor fell over, and used large bows of slightly discoloured ribbon to mask unneeded brackets.

In the reception rooms food-bestrewn parrot stands were left where they ought never to be seen; and there were gilt-wired parrot cages; baskets for the pugs lined with soiled shawls; absurd ornaments, china cats with exaggerated necks, alabaster figures of stereotyped female beauty and flowerpot stands of ornate bamboo.

She loved portieres, and she would fain have mitigated the bareness of the panelled or distempered walls; only that here her husband was firm.