{"product_id":"2940013682573","title":"The Secret Sanctuary","description":"Bartholomew Stretton, Esq., was shown into Beal's dining-room.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Dr. Beal won't keep you a minute, sir.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Quite so, quite so.  He expects me--I think.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMr. Stretton put his hat and gloves on the table, and picking up a\u003cbr\u003emonth-old copy of Punch, looked at one or two of the pictures and\u003cbr\u003ethen discarded the paper with an air of impatience.  He was in no\u003cbr\u003emood to appreciate humour.  He glanced round Beal's dining-room as\u003cbr\u003ethough he disliked it.  His restlessness would not permit him to\u003cbr\u003esit down; it carried him to one of the windows and exhibited to him\u003cbr\u003ea section of Wimpole Street: iron railings, pavement, road, more\u003cbr\u003epavement, more railings, a series of windows and three green front\u003cbr\u003edoors decorated with a number of very clean brass plates.  It was\u003cbr\u003eraining.  People passed with open umbrellas.  To Mr. Stretton the\u003cbr\u003erain, the pavements, the houses, and the people all looked the same\u003cbr\u003ecolour.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Beastly place!\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt occurred to him that he had never seen Wimpole Street till six\u003cbr\u003emonths ago, that it had not existed so far as he was concerned, and\u003cbr\u003ethat it would have had no present existence had he not needed help.\u003cbr\u003eAnd yet he hated the street as a comfort-loving man hates anything\u003cbr\u003ewhich associates itself with some very unpleasant and importunate\u003cbr\u003ereality.  Wimpole Street was an ugly smudge across the suburban\u003cbr\u003eserenity of Mr. Stretton's vision of life.  He had been a\u003cbr\u003esuccessful man, a genially self-satisfied man, and that Fate should\u003cbr\u003ehave administered a kick to him just when he was entering the last\u003cbr\u003elap seemed monstrous and an outrage.  It was the kind of scandal\u003cbr\u003ethat impels a man to write angry letters to the papers--but this\u003cbr\u003eaffair was too personal and too serious for such splutterings in\u003cbr\u003eself-relief.  The problem--for it was a problem--stuck in poor old\u003cbr\u003eStretton's throat, made his lower lip lax and querulous, and gave a\u003cbr\u003eslightly bewildered irritability to his blue eyes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe street depressed him so thoroughly that he turned about and\u003cbr\u003ebegan to wander round the room, looking at Rollin Beal's exquisite\u003cbr\u003eGeorgian furniture and pictures with an air of perfunctory\u003cbr\u003eattention.  He really did not see them, the beauty and the\u003cbr\u003edistinction of them; they were just so many chairs and cabinets and\u003cbr\u003epieces of coloured porcelain and canvas.  He had to look at\u003cbr\u003esomething; the mental attitude of the man who reads every page of\u003cbr\u003ethe morning and the evening paper.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAn oval mirror in a mahogany frame hanging slightly tilted above\u003cbr\u003ethe Adam mantelpiece showed Bartholomew Stretton a reflection of\u003cbr\u003ehimself.  Instantly interested, he paused, like a very young child.\u003cbr\u003eHe put up a hand and smoothed his hair, and gave a little touch to\u003cbr\u003ehis tie.  An observant person could have told him that he belonged\u003cbr\u003eto a previous generation, and that he should have worn a white top-\u003cbr\u003ehat, a white waistcoat and spats, and black-and-white check\u003cbr\u003etrousers.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs a matter of fact, he did wear spats, but they were biscuit-brown\u003cbr\u003ein colour.  Mr. Stretton was very punctilious about being up to\u003cbr\u003edate.  He was very punctilious in all the externals.  When golf\u003cbr\u003eknickers were baggy, he wore them baggy.  He was the most careful\u003cbr\u003eof formalists.  That was why his son's disaster had hurt him so\u003cbr\u003ebadly.  He was sorry for his son; he was sorry for his wife--but he\u003cbr\u003ewas bitterly sorry for himself.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe door opened.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Dr. Beal is ready for you, sir.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBartholomew Stretton was shown into Rollin Beal's consulting-room.\u003cbr\u003eA tall man with kind eyes and an ironical mouth rose from his desk\u003cbr\u003eand extended a hand.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Well, how are things?\"","brand":"WDS Publishing","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47145766256880,"sku":"2940013682573","price":2.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940013682573_p0.jpg?v=1763583900","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940013682573","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}