For a time the dilapidated condition of kitchen and refectory restricted the scale of hospitality at headquarters.  But Lady Mabel soon completed her reforms of house and household, in which she found old Moodie an able assistant.  Captain Cranfield had to bring his labors of love to an end, and Lord Strathern celebrated the event by feasting a large party of his friends.

While the company was assembled, Lady Mabel led a party of the first comers through the apartments, to admire the results of the labor and taste bestowed upon them.  Some of the more prying peeped into the kitchen to see what was going on there.

“I am glad to see,” said Captain Hatton, “that though this is a monastic house, and this a fast day, we shall not have to dine orthodoxly, on bacalhao and sardinhas.”

“Nor be bored with the long Latin grace,” said Major Warren, “which the very walls of the refectory are tired of hearing and not understanding.”

“Would rendering it into English reconcile you to its length?” asked Lady Mabel.

“Not in the least.  I think nothing so heterodox as a long grace, while soup and fish grow cold.”

“I am told,” said Lady Mabel, ascending to the apartment above, “that this was the abbot’s own room.”

“That is very likely,” said Captain Hatton, “from its neighborhood to the kitchen.”

“It is not exactly the apartment,” she continued, “which I would design for a lady’s withdrawing room.  But, if it satisfied the holy father before it was thus improved, it is too good for a heretic like me.  I sometimes feel myself a profane intruder here, and, when I call to mind whom this building belongs to, and see so many red-coated gentry stalking at ease through dormitory, refectory and cloisters, I think of rooks who have fled the rookery, before a flock of flamingoes who usurp their place.”

“The pious crows,” said Captain Hatton, “would forgive our intrusion, did they see the bird of paradise that attracts us hither.”

“Put a weight on your fancy, Captain Hatton,” said Lady Mabel.  “Such another flight and it may soar away altogether.  Pray observe the admirable effect of those hangings, with which Captain Cranfield has concealed the dark and narrow passage that leads to the oratory.”

Major Warren was provoked at the general admiration of Cranfield’s taste and skill, and stung by the repeated thanks with which Lady Mabel repaid his labors, so he endeavored to turn them into ridicule.

“It is a thousand pities, Cranfield, that these happy designs should perish with their temporary use.  Let me beg you to send a sketch of them to Colonel Sturgeon, the head of your department.  They should be preserved among the draughts and plans of the engineer corps.”

Cranfield was about to make angry answer, but Lady Mabel anticipated him by saying:  “doubtless, whenever Colonel Sturgeon has occasion to turn monkish cloisters into ladies’ bowers, it will save him a world of trouble to avail himself of these designs.”