Chapter 15

XV.

Newland Archer arrived at the Chiverses' on Friday
evening, and on Saturday went conscientiously
through all the rites appertaining to a week-end at
Highbank.

In the morning he had a spin in the ice-boat with his
hostess and a few of the hardier guests; in the afternoon
he "went over the farm" with Reggie, and listened,
in the elaborately appointed stables, to long and
impressive disquisitions on the horse; after tea he talked
in a corner of the firelit hall with a young lady who
had professed herself broken-hearted when his engagement
was announced, but was now eager to tell him of
her own matrimonial hopes; and finally, about midnight,
he assisted in putting a gold-fish in one visitor's
bed, dressed up a burglar in the bath-room of a nervous
aunt, and saw in the small hours by joining in a
pillow-fight that ranged from the nurseries to the
basement. But on Sunday after luncheon he borrowed a
cutter, and drove over to Skuytercliff.

People had always been told that the house at
Skuytercliff was an Italian villa. Those who had never
been to Italy believed it; so did some who had. The
house had been built by Mr. van der Luyden in his
youth, on his return from the "grand tour," and in
anticipation of his approaching marriage with Miss
Louisa Dagonet. It was a large square wooden structure,
with tongued and grooved walls painted pale
green and white, a Corinthian portico, and fluted
pilasters between the windows. From the high ground on
which it stood a series of terraces bordered by balustrades
and urns descended in the steel-engraving style
to a small irregular lake with an asphalt edge overhung
by rare weeping conifers. To the right and left, the
famous weedless lawns studded with "specimen" trees
(each of a different variety) rolled away to long ranges
of grass crested with elaborate cast-iron ornaments;
and below, in a hollow, lay the four-roomed stone
house which the first Patroon had built on the land
granted him in 1612.

Against the uniform sheet of snow and the greyish
winter sky the Italian villa loomed up rather grimly;
even in summer it kept its distance, and the boldest
coleus bed had never ventured nearer than thirty feet
from its awful front. Now, as Archer rang the bell, the
long tinkle seemed to echo through a mausoleum; and
the surprise of the butler who at length responded to
the call was as great as though he had been summoned
from his final sleep.

Happily Archer was of the family, and therefore,
irregular though his arrival was, entitled to be informed
that the Countess Olenska was out, having driven to
afternoon service with Mrs. van der Luyden exactly
three quarters of an hour earlier.