"Oh, carpets, of course."

"And what about the stairs?"

"Carpet. And I should have the rail and banisters
white--banisters turned or twisted."

The Colonel said under his breath, "Well, I'm dumned!"
but he gave no utterance to his astonishment in the
architect's presence. When he went at last,--the session
did not end till eleven o'clock,--Lapham said, "Well, Pert,
I guess that fellow's fifty years behind, or ten years ahead.
I wonder what the Ongpeer style is?"

"I don't know. I hated to ask. But he seemed to
understand what he was talking about. I declare, he knows
what a woman wants in a house better than she does herself."

"And a man's simply nowhere in comparison," said Lapham.
But he respected a fellow who could beat him at every point,
and have a reason ready, as this architect had;
and when he recovered from the daze into which the complete
upheaval of all his preconceived notions had left him,
he was in a fit state to swear by the architect.
It seemed to him that he had discovered the fellow (as
he always called him) and owned him now, and the fellow
did nothing to disturb this impression. He entered
into that brief but intense intimacy with the Laphams
which the sympathetic architect holds with his clients.