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That House I Bought

_A LITTLE LEAF FROM LIFE_

BY
HENRY EDWARD WARNER

[Illustration: Logo]

G. W. DILLINGHAM COMPANY
PUBLISHERS      NEW YORK


COPYRIGHT, 1911, BY
G. W. DILLINGHAM COMPANY

_That House I Bought_




DEDICATION


Why a dedication? Why a preface--a foreword? Why any comment, save the
title and the price mark?

Simplicity itself! The preface, foreword, dedication--what you may term
it--gives opportunity to apologize for the liberality with which the
author betrays his egotism, in the thickly sprinkled perpendicular
pronoun.

And yet this plain young tale of plain things could not be told in the
third person, since it is a mere setting down of real experience,
painfully truthful and laboriously pruned where imagination was tempted
to stray into fields of fiction. There is but one confession of romantic
mendacity--and it shall not be made, for it _might_ have happened! Quien
Sabe?

And now this little story is dedicated to all who have bought or intend
to buy homes, who have lost or expect to lose them; to the bird of
passage and to the homing, and to all who love their fellowmen--but very
especially to you who read it.

H. E. W.




CONTENTS

                     PAGE
DEDICATION              5

FIRST PERIOD            7

SECOND PERIOD          18

THIRD PERIOD           31

FOURTH PERIOD          42

FIFTH PERIOD           54

SIXTH PERIOD           68

SEVENTH PERIOD         90

EIGHTH PERIOD         105

NINTH PERIOD          120

TENTH PERIOD          132

ELEVENTH PERIOD       143

THE EVEN DOZENTH      155




That House I Bought




FIRST PERIOD


Thirty-three years ago I formed a box of blocks into a castle and then
kicked it down in disgust because I didn't like the chimney. Mother said
I displayed temper.

Birds build nests in tree-tops with horse-hair and straw, and odd bits
of stuff; but my wife and I aren't birds. Far from it. And we've been
going along for fifteen years without a regular nest. All that time
I've been building a house with blocks and kicking it down.

The other day we went out to Mont Alto to take dinner with our friends,
and on the way we saw a new house numbered "3313." The number stuck out
in letters of silver, burnished into brilliancy by a noonday sun.

"That's an odd number," I remarked. "Anyway you look at it, it's
unlucky--3313. And I'm not superstitious."

"Let's go in and examine it," she said.

That's where it all started. We bought the house after dinner. It took
fifteen minutes to decide, and in that time, of course, we didn't
notice the place on the dining-room ceiling where the plumbing--but let
it pass. The Duke of Mont Alto would fix it up. We had great faith in
the Duke. The point is, we owned a house at last. That is, we had
started to own it. We were tickled to death--also scared to death. There
are two emotions for you, both fatal!

Coming into possession of a castle with ten rooms and large open
plumbing, fronting fifty feet and going back one hundred and fifty-three
feet to the company's stable, is a thrilling experience. My first thrill
was in connection with the initial terms of the contract, which called
for certain financial daring. Up to this time I had laid to my soul the
happy thought that a clean conscience is more than money; but believe
me, friend, a silver quarter began to look like a gold eagle. Change
that in other days went merrily across the table without thought for the
morrow, I found myself wearing to a frazzle, counting the cracks in the
milled edges affectionately, hopefully, and yet with certain misgivings.


Naturally, we first paced off our yard, to see whether it was 50 by 153
feet, more or less, as shown in the plot. Every man who buys a house
paces off his yard. So does his wife. My wife made seventy-eight steps
of it and I made fifty-one, on the length. By deducting for my long legs
and adding for her confining skirt we came to the conclusion that
mathematics was an inexact science, and decided to do it later with a
tape measure.

But for the purpose of this narrative we must get inside the house and
look about. We found a wide hall with a grand staircase; a roomy parlor
connecting by folding door with a spacious dining-room, and off the
dining-room a real conservatory, all glass and tiles. Opening into the
pantry a swinging door, and another into the kitchen, and in the wall a
refrigerator. In the basement a furnace with a barometer and
thermometer atop. On the second floor four big rooms and a centre
hallway, and in the bathroom large, open plumbing and the addition of a
shower and spray bath. On the third floor two cozy rooms and another
hallway and bath. Item: Slate roof; item: water-heated, hot and cold
water all the time sometimes; item: hardwood floor downstairs.
Conveniences in every direction, gas and electric fittings throughout.
And the whole sheltered by oak trees that leaned over to embrace us,
wagging flirtatious branches through the big windows.

"Isn't this living!" I exclaimed.

My wife looked out through the window at the distant picture of the
low-lying city against the bay, and held