“You can show Lori how good you are with babies by changing Bess’s nappy,” said Arthur. “Let’s go inside. I promised Lori a cup of tea.”
Arthur didn’t thrust Bess at me, as Charles Bellingham had done in the churchyard. He simply picked up the diaper bag and walked toward the French doors, with Harriet racing ahead of him and me trailing behind with the pram. I parked the pram next to the doors and followed Arthur and Harriet into one of the most appealing rooms I’d ever entered.
It was a library, a real library, a library that was used every day as opposed to an untouched, highly polished showpiece. The concave plaster ceiling was striped with slender oak ribs that curved down to form pilasters dividing one bookshelf from the next. The oak shelves were crammed with books as well as a jumble of odds and ends that included silver inkstands, bronze busts, building blocks, and baby dolls. Framed maps, technical drawings, and inky little hand prints hung from walls covered with a gorgeous, acanthus leaf–patterned wallpaper.
The fireplace’s muted green tiles were framed by an exquisitely simple oak mantel and the room’s well-worn furnishings looked as though they’d come straight out of William Morris’s nineteenth-century workshop. I detected the hand of a master craftsman in each table, chair, lamp, and rug.
While I gawked like a tourist, Arthur used his cell phone to ring for tea and stood over Harriet while she took care of Bess. I was clearly the only person in the room who was startled to see a sofa upholstered in what appeared to be original William Morris fabric used as a changing table. It then occurred to me that the designer would have been unfazed by the sight. He had, I reminded myself, believed in combining beauty with utility.
“‘Have nothing in your home that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful,’” I said, quoting Morris.
“Ah,” said Arthur, “you’re familiar with the Arts and Crafts movement.”
“I’m a big fan of Arts and Crafts design,” I acknowledged. “I didn’t expect to find so many examples of it here. I thought Hillfont would be furnished with heavy, overdone Victorian pieces.”
“William Morris was a Victorian,” Arthur pointed out, “but he and others like him rebelled against the Victorian norm. My great-great-grandfather was also a big fan of Arts and Crafts design, which is more than a bit ironic.”
“How is it ironic?” I asked.
“Quentin Hargreaves was a manufacturer,” said Arthur. “His fortune was based on industrialization and mass production, yet he filled his home with objects that were handmade by individual craftsmen in small workshops.”
“I’m glad Bess isn’t a boy,” said Harriet. “Boys are squirty.”
My snort of laughter was echoed by Arthur’s. Leave it to a ten-year-old, I thought, to bring a lofty conversation crashing back to ground level.
“They certainly are,” I agreed. “I had to do a lot of ducking and dodging when I changed my sons’ nappies.”
“It was the same for me when Colin was little,” said Harriet, as if she’d spent half of her young life tending babies. She finished repacking the diaper bag and looked up at me imploringly. “May I hold her now?”
“Of course you may,” I said. “If you talk softly to her, she may fall asleep. She’s had a hectic day.”
Harriet sat back on the sofa and Arthur placed Bess in her arms. Harriet didn’t even look up when a burly, middle-aged woman entered the library with the tea.
The tea set wasn’t exactly a set. The chubby blue teapot, the glass sugar bowl, and the china creamer looked as though they’d been picked up for a song at a thrift store, as did the three mismatched teacups and the plate piled high with pinwheel cookies.
“Chamomile,” the woman announced, “as you requested, Mr. Hargreaves.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Ellicott,” said Arthur.
Mrs. Ellicott placed the tea tray on a library table and left the room without saying another word.
“Mrs. Ellicott isn’t talkative,” said Arthur, “but she’s a superlative cook.”
“I made the biscuits,” Harriet announced. “I’m experimenting with cacao beans.”
“They’re safe to eat,” Arthur said, offering the plate of cookies to me.
“They’re delicious,” I said, after I’d tried one. “Your experiment was successful, Harriet.”
“Still a bit grainy,” Harriet said, observing the plate reflectively. “I’ll try a finer grind next time.”
Harriet was too absorbed in Bess to drink her cup of tea, but Arthur sipped his and I guzzled mine thirstily while he gave me a tour of the library. Though I loved books, I was drawn to the framed technical drawings of catapults, water wheels, and primitive flying machines.
“Quentin did most of the drawings,” Arthur told me. “He was a skilled draftsman and an inventor. He would imagine a structure, draw it, then build experimental models. He bought a large estate so he could pursue his dreams in peace.”