"Japanese? No!" he declared. "The little men with their storks and vases
have merely discovered to us in decoration a principle which was Greek in
a more majestic world than theirs. It was the true instinct of the
classic motherhood of our art before collectors mistook their residences
for warehouses."

"And the books?" Jack asked, boyishly. "Where are they? Yes, what do you
do with all the second-class matter?"

The question was bait to Jasper Ewold. It gave him an opportunity for
discourse.

"When I read I want nothing but a paper-cutter close at hand--a good, big
paper-cutter, whose own weight carries it through the leaves. And I want
to be alone with that book. If I am too lazy to go to the library for
another, then it is not worth reading. When I get head-achy with print
and look up, I don't want to stare at the backs of more books. I want
something to rest and fill the eye. I--"

"Father," Mary admonished him, "I fear this is going to be long. Why not
continue after Mr. Wingfield has washed off the dust of travel and we are
at table?"

"Mary is merely jealous. She wants to hurry you to the dining-room, which
was designed to her taste," answered her father, with an affectation of
grand indignation. "The dust of travel here is clean desert dust--but I
admit that it is gritty. Come with me, Sir Chaps!"

He bade Jack precede him through a door diagonally opposite the one by