“Excellent idea, if we could be certain of letting it. But we can’t be certain of letting it, and all the time a stream of rates and taxes, and caretakers. It would be wretched to be always anxious about it, and always counting the dibs. I’ve been going into what we spent there this summer, _caro_, and it staggered me. What I vote for, is to sell it. I’m not going to use it without you, and you’re not going to use it at all. You know how I looked forward to being there for your sake, your club, the Reading Room at the British Museum, the Astronomer Royal, but now that’s all kaput, as Tony says. We’ll bring down here anything that’s particularly connected with dear Auntie: her portrait by Sargent, of course, though Sargents are fetching immense prices; or the walnut bureau, or the Chippendale chairs or that little worsted rug in her bedroom; but I vote for selling it all, freehold, furniture, everything. As if I couldn’t go up to Claridge’s now and then, when I want to have a luncheon-party or two of all our friends! And then we shall have no more anxieties, and if they say you must get away from the cold and the damp, we shall know we’re doing nothing on the margin of our means. That would be hateful: we mustn’t do that.” “But you’ll never be able to be content with Riseholme again,” said Pepino. “After your balls and your parties and all that, what will you find to do here?” Lucia turned her gimlet-eye on him. “I shall be a great fool if I don’t find something to do,” she said. “Was I so idle and unoccupied before we went to London? Good gracious, I was always worked to death here. Don’t you bother your head about that, Pepino, for if you do it will show you don’t understand me at all. And our dear Riseholme, let me tell you, has got very slack and inert in our absence, and I feel very guilty about that. There’s nothing going on: there’s none of the old fizz and bubble and Excelsior there used to be. They’re vegetating, they’re dry-rotting, and Georgie’s getting fat. There’s never any news. All that happens is that Daisy slashes a golf-ball about the Green for practice in the morning, and then goes down to the links in the afternoon, and positively the only news next day is whether she has been round under a thousand strokes, whatever that means.” Lucia gave a little indulgent sigh.