Arnold Bennett

Tales of the Five Towns Arnold Bennett

The dining-room of The Firs was a spacious and inviting refectory, which owed nothing of itscharm to William Morris, Regent Street, or the Arts and Crafts Society. Its triple aim, was richness, solidity, and comfort, but especially comfort; and this aim was achieved in new oak furniture ofimmovable firmness, in a Turkey carpet which swallowed up the feet like a feather bed, and in largeoil-paintings, whose darkly-glinting frames were a guarantee of their excellence. On a winter's night, as now, the room was at its richest, solidest, most comfortable. The blue plush curtains were drawnon their stout brass rods across door and French window. Finest selected silkstone fizzed andflamed in a patent grate which had the extraordinary gift of radiating heat into the apartment insteadof up the chimney. The shaded Welsbach lights of the chandelier cast a dazzling luminance on thetea-table of snow and silver, while leaving the pictures in a gloom so discreet that not Ruskin himselfcould have decided whether these were by Whistler or Peter Paul Rubens. On either side of themarble mantelpiece were two easy-chairs of an immense, incredible capacity, chairs of crimson plushfor Titans, chairs softer than moss, more pliant than a loving heart, more enveloping than a caress. In one of these chairs, that to the left of the fireplace, Mr. Curtenty was accustomed to snore everySaturday and Sunday afternoon, and almost every evening. The other was usually empty, but tonight it was occupied by Mrs. Curtenty, the jewel of the casket. In the presence of her husband shealways used a small rocking-chair of ebonized can