Page:Small Souls (1919).djvu/131

Rh “There are the two rooms opening into each other on the ground-floor,” said Addie, standing, with a serious face, between Paul’s knees. “Upstairs, you can have the big bedroom and Papa the smaller one, with a little room next to it as a smoking-room; and then I should like that turret-room, with the bow-window, you know. . . .”

“Yes; but, Addie, the house in the Emmastraat has bigger rooms.”

“It is farther from Granny and two hundred guilders dearer; so put the house in the Emmastraat out of your mind. . . .”

Granny van Lowe sat looking before her in dumb amazement; Paul listened attentively; and Constance and Addie continued to discuss the merits and demerits of the two houses:

“There’s a big cellar in the house near the Woods. . . and a nice little garden, do you remember? . . . And I think it jolly to be close to the Woods.”

“Yes; but, Addie, it seems to me that, in the Emmastraat. . .”

“Do put that house out of your mind, Mamma: it’s damp. . . .”

“And the contractor is coming, you say?”

“Yes, at seven o’clock.”

Mamma van Lowe could only sit and stare at her daughter and her grandson by turns. Paul burst into a fresh roar of laughter at the sight of his mother’s face.

“Yes, Mother, these are the times we live in! I never dared take a house for you; now did I?”