Page:The Works of H G Wells Volume 8.djvu/406

 good deal, and then Pierce raised the question whether one ought to go in the first instance to a builder at all and not rather to an architect. Pierce knew a man at Ashford whose brother was an architect, and as it is always better in these matters to get someone you know, the Kippses decided, before Pierce had gone and Carshot's warnings had resumed their sway, to apply to him. They did so—rather dubiously.

The architect who was brother of Pierce's friend appeared as a small, alert individual with a black bag and a cylindrical silk hat, and he sat at the dining-room table with his hat and his bag exactly equidistant right and left of him, and maintained a demeanour of impressive woodenness while Kipps on the hearthrug, with a quaking sense of gigantic enterprise, vacillated answers to his inquiries. Ann held a watching brief for herself, in a position she had chosen as suitable to the occasion beside the corner of the carved oak sideboard. They felt, in a sense, at bay.

The architect began by asking for the site, and seemed a little discomposed to discover this had still to be found. "I thought of building just anywhere," said Kipps. "I 'aven't made up my mind about that yet." The architect remarked that he would have preferred to see the site in order to know where to put what he called his "ugly side," but it was quite possible of course to plan a house "in the air," on the level, "simply with back and front assumed"—if they would like to do that. Kipps flushed slightly, and secretly hoping it would make no great difference in