The Brassfields' country house was copied from an historic French
chateau. In the drawing-room, the high walls, from which well-known
portraits stood forth, were paneled with amber-hued wood overlaid with
elaborate gilt traceries; they ended in a wide golden frieze that
curved inward to inclose a ceiling painted with roguish goddesses after
the manner of Watteau. Here and there, between chairs and sofas the
arms of which seemed composed of half-melted ingots, appeared a baroque
cabinet filled with small, precious objects. Or from a creamy pedestal
the marble features of some ancient sybarite regarded without surprise
this modern richness based upon the past.
Emerging from the dining room, the ladies crossed the large amber rug,
like moving images made of multicolored light.
Below their negligible bodices hung draperies of brocade interwoven
with metallic threads, of lace dyed the colors of exotic flowers, of
tulle embroidered with iridescent beads. Parting into groups, they
dotted the drawing-room with the gorgeousness of peacock blue and jade
green, the joyousness of petunias and the melancholy of orchids, or the
pale, intermelting tints of rainbows seen through the spangle of a
shower.
Some, unfurling fans before their bosoms, sank down upon the chairs and
sofas. Others stood beside the large chimney piece, talking to the
men, and smoking cigarettes that were thrust into jeweled holders.
A few emerged through the French windows upon the terrace to enjoy the
moonlit landscape, wherein Nature herself had been taught to show a
charming artificiality.
An esplanade overlooked an aquatic garden, with three pools full of
water flowers massed round statues. Below, in broad stages that fell
away toward a wooded valley, lay other gardens, deriving a vague
stateliness from their successive balustrades and sculptured fountains.
The moonlight, while blanching the geometrical pattern of the paths,
and frosting the rectangular flowerbeds, imparted to the whole
surrounding, billowing panorama an appearance of unreality.
"Where's Lilla?" Fanny Brassfield inquired of a young man in the
doorway of the drawing-room, in her clear, grating voice that seemed
made to express an involuntary disdain of everything not comprised in
her luxurious little world. She had just seen one of her most recent
lions, old Brantome, on his way toward the music room amid a group of
ladies; and this had recalled to her mind another celebrity, who, five
minutes before, had arrived from the city after she had given up
expecting him.
"Shall I find her?"
"Never mind, my surprise can wait."
Fanny Brassfield followed Brantome and his coterie into the music room,
her attractive, bony features revealing a quizzical expression. In the
glitter of the big chandelier her coiffure appeared extraordinarily
blonde, her green eyes, especially frosty; and the eighteenth century
ladies in the gilded frames seemed suddenly, despite their histories,
insipid in comparison with this modern face, emancipated from a
thousand traditional reactions.
As for Lilla, she was sitting in the dim library with Cornelius
Rysbroek, who was harping on the old tune.