CHAPTER THREE

The name was no indication.  None remembered that Dowlands was the name of Henry the Eight’s favourite lute player, and there was nothing in the snug masonry to suggest an aestheticism of any kind.  The dulcimers, lutes and virginals surprised the visitor coming in from the street, and he stayed his steps as he might on the threshold of a fairy land.

The villas, of which Dowlands was one, were a builder’s experiment.  They had been built in the hopes of attracting wealthy business West-end shopkeepers; but Dulwich had failed to become a fashionable suburb.  Many had remained empty, and when Mr. Innes had entered into negotiations with the house agents, they declared themselves willing to entertain all his proposals, and finally he had acquired a lease at a greatly reduced rental.

In accordance with his and Mrs. Innes’s wishes, the house had been considerably altered.  Partition walls had been taken away, and practically the whole ground floor converted into class-rooms, leaving free only one little room at the back where they had their meals.  During his wife’s lifetime the house suited their requirements.  The train service from Victoria was frequent, and on the back of their notepaper was printed a little map, whereby pupils coming and going from the station could find their way.  On the second floor was Mr. Innes’s workshop, where he restored the old instruments or made new ones after the old models.  There was Evelyn’s bedroom—­her mother had re-furnished it before she died—­and she often sat there; it was, in truth, the most habitable room in the house.  There was Evelyn’s old nursery, now an unoccupied room; and there were two other empty rooms.  She had tried to convert one into a little oratory.  She had placed there a statue of the Virgin, and hung a crucifix on the wall, and bought a prie-Dieu and put it there.  But the room was too lonely, and she found she could say her prayers more fervently by her bedside.  Their one servant slept downstairs in a room behind the kitchen.  So the house often had the appearance of a deserted house; and Evelyn, when she returned from London, where she went almost daily to give music lessons, often paused on the threshold, afraid to enter till her ear detected some slight sound of her servant at work.  Then she cried, “Is that you, Margaret?” and she advanced cautiously, till Margaret answered, “Yes, miss.”

The last summer and autumn had been the pleasantest in her life since her mother’s death.  Her pupils interested her—­she had some six or seven.  Her flow of bright talk, her eager manner, her beautiful playing of the viola da gamba, her singing of certain old songs, her mother’s fame, and the hopes she entertained of one day achieving success on the stage made her a heroine among her little circle of friends.  Her father was a remarkable man, but he seemed to her the most wonderful of men.