I was waiting in the sitting-room when he came down. There was a roaring
fire in the big, old-fashioned fireplace. That fireplace had been
bricked up in the days when people used those abominations, stoves. As a
boy I was well acquainted with the old "gas burner" with the iron urn
on top and the nickeled ornaments and handles which Mother polished so
assiduously. But the gas burner had long since gone to the junk dealer.
Among the improvements which my first royalty checks made possible were
steam heat and the restoration of the fireplace.

Jim found me sitting before the fire in one of the two big "wing" chairs
which I had purchased when Darius Barlay's household effects were sold
at auction. I should not have acquired them as cheaply if Captain Cyrus
Whittaker had been at home when the auction took place. Captain Cy loves
old-fashioned things as much as I do and, as he has often told me since,
he meant to land those chairs some day if he had to run his bank account
high and dry in consequence. But the Captain and his wife--who used to
be Phoebe Dawes, our school-teacher here in Bayport--were away visiting
their adopted daughter, Emily, who is married and living in Boston, and
I got the chairs.

At the Barclay auction I bought also the oil painting of the bark
"Freedom"--a command of Captain Elkanah Barclay, uncle of the late
Darius--and the set--two volumes missing--of The Spectator, bound in
sheepskin. The "Freedom" is depicted "Entering the Port of Genoa, July
10th, 1848," and if the port is somewhat wavy and uncertain, the
bark's canvas and rigging are definite and rigid enough to make up.
The Spectator set is chiefly remarkable for its marginal notes; Captain
Elkanah bought the books in London and read and annotated at spare
intervals during subsequent voyages. His opinions were decided and his