"Surest thing you know." He grinned like a schoolboy. "It's really ours, that's what it is. I've broken away from the mater at last," he added a little sheepishly. "I'm going to work seriously. I've got an all-day desk job in my uncle's office and I'm going to dig in and see what I can make of myself. Also, this is going to be our headquarters, and Eleanor's permanent home if we're all agreed upon it,--but look around, ladies. Don't spare my blushes. If you think I can interior decorate, just tell me so frankly. This is the living-room." "It's like that old conundrum--black and white and red all over," Gertrude said. "I never saw anything so stunning in all my life." "Gosh! I admire your nerve," Peter cried, "papering this place in white, and then getting in all this heavy carved black stuff, and the red in the tapestries and screens and pillows." "I wanted it to look studioish a little," David explained, "I wanted to get away from Louis Quartorze." "And drawing-rooms like mother used to make," Gertrude suggested. "I like your Oriental touches. Do you see, Margaret, everything is Indian or Chinese? The ubiquitous Japanese print is conspicuous by its absence." "I've got two portfolios full of 'em," David said, "and I always have one or two up in the bedrooms. I change 'em around, you know, the way the Japs do themselves, a different scene every few days and the rest decently out of sight till you're ready for 'em." "It's like a fairy story," Margaret said. "I thought you'd appreciate what little Arabian Nights I was able to introduce. I bought that screen," he indicated a sweep of Chinese line and color, "with my eye on you, and that Aladdin's lamp is yours, of course. You're to come in here and rub it whenever you like, and your heart's desire will instantly be vouchsafed to you." "What will Eleanor say?" Peter suggested, as David led the way through the corridor and up the tiny stairs which led to the more intricate part of the establishment. "This is her room, didn't you say, David?" He paused on the threshold of a bedroom done in ivory white and yellow, with all its hangings of a soft golden silk. "She once said that she wanted a yellow room," David said, "a daffy-down-dilly room, and I've tried to get her one. I know last year that Maggie Lou child refused to have yellow curtains in that flatiron shaped sitting-room of theirs, and Eleanor refused to be comforted." A wild whoop in the below stairs announced Jimmie; and Beulah arrived simultaneously with the tea tray. Jimmie was ecstatic when the actual function of the place was explained to him. "Headquarters is the one thing we've lacked," he said; "a place of our own, hully gee! It makes me feel almost human again." "You haven't been feeling altogether human lately, have you, Jimmie?" Margaret asked over her tea cup.