“Not arches,” I corrected him; “Arch. The Norman arch was downstairs in the kitchen. It was the kitchen, that had been built in the thirteenth century—and had not had much done to it since, apparently. Originally, I should say, it had been the torture chamber; it gave you that idea. I think your mother would have raised objections to the kitchen—anyhow, when she came to think of the cook. It would have been necessary to put it to the woman before engaging her:— “‘You don’t mind cooking in a dungeon in the dark, do you?’ “Some cooks would. The rest of the house was what I should describe as present-day mixed style. The last tenant but one had thrown out a bathroom in corrugated iron.” “Then there was a house in Berkshire that I took your mother to see, with a trout stream running through the grounds. I imagined myself going out after lunch, catching trout for dinner; inviting swagger friends down to ‘my little place in Berkshire’ for a few days’ trout-fishing. There is a man I once knew who is now a baronet. He used to be keen on fishing. I thought maybe I’d get him. It would have looked well in the Literary Gossip column: ‘Among the other distinguished guests’—you know the sort of thing. I had the paragraph already in my mind. The wonder is I didn’t buy a rod.” “Wasn’t there any trout stream?” questioned Robin. “There was a stream,” I answered; “if anything, too much stream. The stream was the first thing your mother noticed. She noticed it a quarter of an hour before we came to it—before we knew it was the stream. We drove back to the town, and she bought a smelling-bottle, the larger size. “It gave your mother a headache, that stream, and made me mad. The agent’s office was opposite the station. I allowed myself half an hour on my way back to tell him what I thought of him, and then I missed the train. I could have got it in if he had let me talk all the time, but he would interrupt. He said it was the people at the paper-mill—that he had spoken to them about it more than once; he seemed to think sympathy was all I wanted. He assured me, on his word as a house-agent, that it had once been a trout stream. The fact was historical. Isaac Walton had fished there—that was prior to the paper-mill. He thought a collection of trout, male and female, might be bought and placed in it; preference being given to some hardy breed of trout, accustomed to roughing it. I told him I wasn’t looking for a place where I could play at being Noah; and left him, as I explained to him, with the intention of going straight to my solicitors and instituting proceedings against him for talking like a fool; and he put on his hat and went across to his solicitors to commence proceedings against me for libel.