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Page 50
"My armor is intact, but, for a moment, I have lowered my shield and it
has cost me an effort to raise it again, I supposed my mind was fixed
beyond the possibility of change, but this is a wonderfully taking
plan. At first I felt that if our lot had not been bought and the
foundation actually begun we would certainly begin anew and have a
house something like these plans. Then it occurred to me that in
building a house that is to be our home as long as we live, perhaps,
it would be the height of absurdity to tie ourselves down to one little
spot on the broad face of this great, beautiful world and live in a
house that will never be satisfactory, just because we happen to have
this bit of land in our possession and have spent upon it a few hundred
dollars."
"Sensible, as usual. What next?"
"Well, this last and best discovery of Aunt Melville's was undoubtedly
made like our own plan to fit a particular site, and it seems beginning
at the wrong end to arrange the house first and then try to find a lot
to suit it."
"I don't see it in that light," said Jack. "I know the architect has
been preaching the importance of adapting the plan to the lot, but if
two thousand dollars are going into the land and eight thousand into
the house, I should say the house is entitled to the first choice."
"Certainly, if it was a city lot, with no character of its own, a mere
rectangular piece of land shut in upon three sides and open at one. But
ours has certain strong points not to be found in any other unoccupied
lot in town. Besides, there are other reasons why it would not answer
for us; but _if_ our lot was right for it, and _if_ we wanted so large
a house, _how_ I should enjoy building it!"
"I don't see anything so very remarkable about the plan," said Jack,
taking up the drawings.
"My dear, short-sighted husband," said Jill with the utmost
impressiveness of tone and manner, "it is a _one-story house_. 'There
shall be no more stairs' sounds almost as delightful as the scriptural
promise of no more sea. And look at the plan itself: The great square
vestibule, or reception-room, with the office at one side--wouldn't
you enjoy that, Jack?--then a few steps higher the big keeping-room,
with a huge fireplace confronting you, and room enough for--anything.
For games, for dancing, for a billiard table, for a grand piano, for a
hammock--or--"
"Say a sewing machine, a spinning-wheel or something useful."
"Anything you like, a studio or a picture gallery, for it is twice as
high as the other rooms, and lighted from the roof. At the right of
this, and with such a great wide door between them that they seem like
two parts of the same room, is the sitting-room, with another great
fireplace in the corner, bay window and a conservatory fronting the
wide entrance to the dining-room, at the farther end of which there is
still another grand fireplace, with a stained-glass window above it.
These three rooms--four, if we count the conservatory--are just as near
perfection as possible. Then see the long line of chambers, closets and
dressing-rooms running around the south and east sides, every one with
a southern window, and all communicating with the corridor that leads
from the keeping-room, yet sufficiently united to form a complete
family suite. The first floor--I mean the _one_ floor--is five or six
feet from the ground, so there can be no dampness in the rooms--and
just think what a cellar! Altogether too much for us."
"Indeed, there isn't. I'd have a bowling alley, a skating rink, a
machine shop, a tennis court, and--a rifle range. Yes, it _is_ a taking
plan, but there are two things that I don't understand. How can you
cover such a big box, and where is the cooking to be done?"
[Illustration: FIRST FLOOR PLAN OF "THE OAKS."]
"The old rule of two negatives applies. Even a one-story house must
have a roof, and the breadth of this makes a roof large enough to hold
not only the kitchen but the servants' room on the same upper level."
"A kitchen up stairs!" exclaimed Jack, for once startled into
solemnity.
"Aunt Melville considers this the crowning glory of the plan. Owing to
this elevation of the cooking range there is no back door, no back
yard, no chance for an uncouth or an unsightly precinct at either side
of the house."
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