Page:Bad Girl (1929).pdf/107

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more comfortable one. There was a bridge lamp beside the sofa. It had a black iron base and a charming shade upon which was the silhouette of a geisha being obligingly carted about town in the silhouette of a jinrickshaw.

Against the opposite wall was a chest of drawers where Dot kept the dining-room and kitchen linen. It was chestnut and had knobs which, as though they themselves were not adequate for their jobs, provided little metal pulls on their neat rounded ends.

The wall paper was unfortunately not delft blue. The landlord had of course given Dot her choice of several samples, but inasmuch as there was not a delft blue in the collection, she had chosen sand color.

Edna said that sand color was a good background for pictures; so Dot had to have pictures. She dumped a photograph of her brother Jim out of a gilt oval frame and replaced it with a shiny green likeness of Pola Negri cut from a movie magazine. Then there was the picture that Edna had had taken of herself and Floyd while Floyd was still young enough to be manageable. Whistler's "Magnolia Tree" was Sue Cudahy's contribution to the living-room. A plaster-of-paris plaque of a Gibson girl in linen duster, veil, and goggles gave a hint of the esthetic pursuits of Edna's youth.

Dot's heart had been set on candlesticks. There's something dressy about mahogany-stained candlesticks with tall, imposing candles. On the day that she made these purchases, the Woolworth had been out of delft blue candles; so she had taken pale green ones.

The pictures and the candles were indeed big factors in the success of the living-room, but Dot felt that not enough credit was given the chandelier. It belonged to the house, of course, and Dot tried not to think that she might some day move away from it. It was a white bowl supported by a thick brass chain and nicely finished off