Page:Saxe Holm's Stories, Series Two.djvu/270

260 Cornices of the same were at the windows. The cornices were all of one pattern—mingled woodbine sprays of deep crimson on light blue. These were the most beautiful things in the room.

"That 's the way our woodbine branches look in November, blowing between your eyes and the blue sky," said Ally, eagerly, as I was studying them and wondering how the combination could be so daring and seem so simple. The effect of all this dark mahogany was heightened by a pale uniform gray tint on the walls and in the carpet. There was no bright color on the floor except in the rug before the fire. The rug was of heavy gray felt. In one corner were two palm-trees, with gorgeous blue and red parrots swinging from their branches, the palm-trees copied truly from a photograph of a palm, and not looking in the least like the tall, flattened feather dusters which are the conventional rendering of the theoretical palm-tree. A mahogany easel stood in front of the abutilon-tree, and on this was a superb photograph of the Venus of Milo. The pure white statue gleamed out among the rich dark colorings about it. The furniture was covered with crimson and blue chintz, and the curtains were of a creamy white, of some curious filigreed Indian material, which had come from the treasures of the same old sea captain who had unwittingly brought all the way from the Brazil forests the settings for Ally's pictures.

"I hope the old man sees his mahogany now,