"Oh, I know he did."

"I don't see why he couldn't write to 'Rene, if he really
meant anything."

"Well, I guess that wouldn't be their way," said Mrs. Lapham;
she did not at all know what their way would be.

When the spring opened Colonel Lapham showed that he had
been in earnest about building on the New Land. His idea
of a house was a brown-stone front, four stories high,
and a French roof with an air-chamber above. Inside,
there was to be a reception-room on the street and a
dining-room back. The parlours were to be on the second floor,
and finished in black walnut or party-coloured paint.
The chambers were to be on the three floors above,
front and rear, with side-rooms over the front door.
Black walnut was to be used everywhere except in the attic,
which was to be painted and grained to look like
black walnut. The whole was to be very high-studded,
and there were to be handsome cornices and elaborate
centre-pieces throughout, except, again, in the attic.

These ideas he had formed from the inspection of many
new buildings which he had seen going up, and which he
had a passion for looking into. He was confirmed in his
ideas by a master builder who had put up a great many
houses on the Back Bay as a speculation, and who told
him that if he wanted to have a house in the style,
that was the way to have it.