Forty years ago the house reproduced
within and without "the best taste" of the period, and was as bad as the
Berkeleys could afford to make it. Since then fashions had come and
gone; yet the hospitable home remained as unchanged as the politics of
the host or the figure of the hostess. The Berkeleys were still content
to be "old-fashioned people," with the fine feeling and the
indiscriminate taste of an era which had flowered not in architecture
but in character, when the standard of living was high and the style in
furniture correspondingly low. To-night the ten guests (the Berkeleys
never gave large dinners) had been carefully chosen, and the evening
would probably be distinguished by good talk and good wine. Though they
were law-abiding persons to the core, the bitterness of the Eighteenth
Amendment had not penetrated to the subterranean darkness where Mr.
Berkeley's treasures were stored.
Mrs. Berkeley, a brisk, compact little woman, with a pretty florid face
and the prominent bosom and tapering waist of forty years ago, turned
from the Governor as Corinna and the Judge entered, and hurried forward
in her animated way, which reminded one of the manner of a child that is
trying to make a success of a dolls' party.
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