Miss Dunstable in procuring it had had her usual
luck. It had been built by an eccentric millionaire at an enormous
cost; and the eccentric millionaire, after living in it for twelve
months, had declared that it did not possess a single comfort, and
that it was deficient in most of those details which, in point of
house accommodation, are necessary to the very existence of man.
Consequently the mansion was sold, and Miss Dunstable was the
purchaser. Cranbourn House it had been named, and its present owner
had made no change in this respect; but the world at large very
generally called it Ointment Hall, and Miss Dunstable herself as
frequently used that name for it as any other. It was impossible to
quiz Miss Dunstable with any success, because she always joined in
the joke herself. Not a word further had passed between Mrs. Gresham
and Dr. Thorne on the subject of their last conversation; but the
doctor as he entered the lady's portals amongst a tribe of servants
and in a glare of light, and saw the crowd before him and the crowd
behind him, felt that it was quite impossible that he should ever be
at home there. It might be all right that a Miss Dunstable should
live in this way, but it could not be right that the wife of Dr.
Thorne should so live.
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