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 common in Virginia country houses. At table they sat in common Windsor chairs, but ate off Sèvres china; a rickety sideboard was loaded down with plate. The Virginians were, as a rule, indifferent to comforts, but luxuries they must have. After the luncheon Pembroke took them to the library, and through such of the house as was habitable. Madame Koller raved over the fine editions of books, the old mahogany furniture, the antique portraits intermingled with daubs of later ancestors—the whole an epitome of the careless pleasure-loving, disjointed life of the dead and gone Virginia—when the people stocked their cellars with the best wines and slept on husk mattresses—where the most elaborate etiquette was maintained in the midst of incongruities of living most startling. It had never ceased to be puzzling to Madame Koller. She admired, as well she might, a lovely girlish portrait of Pembroke's mother which hung in the drawing room. There was a piteous likeness between it and the one unscarred side of Miles' face.

Miles had kept close to Olivia—he was not quite easy with Madame Koller. As for Madame Schmidt, he had in vain tried to get something out of her, but the old lady was obviously so much more comfortable seated by the drawing-room fire, well wrapped up, with her feet on the footstool, and nobody to distract her attention from keeping warm, that she was considerately left to herself.

But Madame Koller did not enjoy the day, as,