Henry Hindes’ house was the most remarkable in Hampstead. It was called ‘The Old Hall,’ and was supposed to have been built more than two hundred years before. It was situated within ten minutes’ walk of Mr Crampton’s place, ‘The Cedars,’ but the two mansions belonged to different eras of the world’s history. ‘The Cedars’ was fitted in the most luxurious style. Everything that money could possibly buy, or build up, had been added to it, to increase its convenience and comfort. It revelled in glass houses, expensive out-buildings, swimming and other baths, and all the luxuries of the prevailing season. But everything about it was painfully new. Mr Crampton had purchased a freehold of the ground, and built ‘The Cedars’ for himself, or rather for the daughter who was to come after him. Often had he said to his wife that when their Jenny married, they would find a smaller place for themselves, and make ‘The Cedars’ part of her marriage portion. Consequently, he had lavished money upon it, letting the builders and upholsterers have their own way in everything, because it was only so much more for Jenny, when she came, like a young queen, into the property her father’s love had prepared for her. But ‘The Old Hall’ was a very different sort of dwelling-place. Henry Hindes was a man of refined tastes and culture, a man who, before he had come into his father’s business, had travelled much and seen the world of art and science, and cultivated his mind, and raised his ideas of beauty and workmanship. He hated business and all its details, and, had it not been for his children’s sake, and the loss it would prove to them, would have sold his share of it for whatever it might fetch, and given up his life to the pursuit of his fancy. As it was, he refreshed himself, in the intervals of less congenial work, by making his home as beautiful as he could, but in a very different fashion from that of the Cramptons. ‘The Old Hall’ had low-roofed rooms, wainscotted with black oak, into which he would not permit the innovation of gas, and ghostly corridors that ran the whole length of the building, and stained glass windows which let in very little light, and made the house dark and gloomy in the eyes of such Philistines as could not appreciate medieval customs, and the relics of barbarism which made the delight of its owner’s heart.