It was a rich friendly room, comfortably homelike in spite of its size, for it crossed the center of the house, its rear door opening on the garden as the one opposite did on the path. It was spacious in height as well as width, its walls rising two stories. Midway up a gallery ran, on three sides of which the bedrooms opened. The fourth side, on the seaward front, was flanked by a line of windows, great squares of unsullied glass that looked over the garden and the amphitheater to the uplands and the open ocean. There were tables here, raking wicker chairs, and low settees with brilliant cushions, books lying about and smokers’ materials. In the room below the character of a hunting lodge had been suggested by mounted deer heads, Indian blankets, baskets of cunning weave and animal skins on the floor. But it was an idealized hunting lodge, with seats in which the body sank luxuriously, and softly shaded lights. Round the deep-mouthed chimney the scent of wood fires lingered, the fires of birch logs that leaped there when Gull Island lay under storm and mist. The architect had not diminished the effect of size and unencumbered space by stairs. The second story was reached by two flights, one in the entrance hall, one in the kitchen wing. Bassett opened the door into the hall where again all was quiet, none of the jarring accents that occasionally rose from the Stokes’ room. He walked across the gleaming parquette to the library which he had used for his office. There were no signs of the hunting lodge here--a scholarly retreat, book-lined, with leather armchairs and lights arranged for readers’ eyes, a place for delightful hours if one had time to drowse and poke about on the shelves. Two long French windows framed a view of the channel and Hayworth dreaming among its elms. He went to one of the windows and looked out. The girls were still sitting there, and, as he looked at them, an expression of infinite tenderness lay like a light on his face. It was the light Shine had noticed, allowed to break through clearly now that no one was there to see. He sat down at the desk; there were letters for him to answer, addenda of the performance to check up. He moved the papers, looked at them, pushed them away, and, resting his forehead on his hands, relinquished himself to a deep pervading happiness. Yesterday Anne had promised to marry him.