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Quicksand

since you‘re going to be in New York, why don‘t you stay here with me? I don‘t usually take people. It‘s too disrupting. Still, it is sort of pleasant having somebody in the house and I don‘t seem to mind you. You don‘t bore me, or bother me. If you‘d like to stay—Think it over.”

Helga didn‘t, of course, require to think it over, because lodgment in Anne‘s home was in complete accord with what she designated as her “æsthetic sense.” Even Helga Crane approved of Anne‘s house and the furnishings which so admirably graced the big cream-colored rooms. Beds with long, tapering posts to which tremendous age lent dignity and interest, bonneted old highboys, tables that might be by Duncan Phyfe, rare spindle-legged chairs, and others whose ladder backs gracefully climbed the delicate wall panels. These historic things mingled harmoniously and comfortably with brass-bound Chinese tea-chests, luxurious deep chairs and davenports, tiny

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