The house without was of timber and plaster, very solidly built, but in no way pretentious; and the plaster was stamped, in panels, with a kind of comb-pattern in half circles, peculiar, my cousin told me, to that part of the country.  Within, it was very pleasant.  There was a little passage as we came in, and to right and left lay the Great Chamber (as it was called), and the dining-room.  Beyond the little passage was the staircase, panelled all the way up, with the instruments of the Passion and other emblems carved on a row of the panels; and at the foot of the staircase on the right lay a little parlour, very pretty, with hangings presenting the knights of the Holy Grail riding upon their Quest.  Upon the left of the staircase, lay a paved hall, with a little pantry under the stairs, to the left, and the kitchens running out to the back; and opposite to them, enclosing a little grassed court, the brewhouse and the bakehouse.  Behind all lay the kitchen gardens; and behind the brewhouse a row of old yews and a part of the lawn, that also ran before the house.  The house was of three stories high, and contained about twenty rooms with the attics.

It is strange how some houses, upon a first acquaintance with them, seem like old friends; and how others, though one may have lived in them fifty years are never familiar to those who live in them.  Now Hare Street House was one of the first kind.  This very day that I first set eyes on it, it was as if I had lived there as a child.  The sunlight streamed into the Great Chamber, and past the yews into the parlour; and upon the lawns outside; and the noise of the bees in the limes was as if an organ played softly; and it was all to me as if I had known it a hundred years.

My Cousin Tom carried me upstairs presently to the Guest-chamber—­a great panelled room, with a wide fire-place, above the dining-room—­that I might wash my hands and face before dinner; and my heart smote me a little for all my thoughts of him, for, when all was said, he had received me very hospitably, and was now bidding me welcome again, and that I must live there as long as I would, and think of it as my home.

“And here,” he said, opening a door at the foot of the bed, “is a little closet where your man can hang your clothes; it looks out upon the yard; and my room is beyond it, over the kitchen.”

I thanked him again and again for his kindness; and so he left me.

* * * * *

We dined below presently, very excellently.  The room was hung with green, with panels of another pattern upon it; and the dishes were put in through a little hatch from the kitchen passage.  My man James waited with the rest, and acquitted himself very well.  Then after dinner, when the servants were gone away, my Cousin Tom carried me out, with a mysterious air, to the foot of the stairs.

“Now look well round you, Cousin Roger,” he said, when he had me standing there; “and see if there be anything that would draw your attention.”