The Wooden Hand by Fergus Hume — Read

Mr. Hill's house at the far end of the village was an eccentric building. Originally it had been a labourer's cottage, and stood by itself, a stone-throw away from the crooked highway which bisected Wargrove. On arriving in the neighbourhood some twenty-five years before, Mr. Hill had bought the cottage and five acres of land around. These he enclosed with a high wall of red brick, and then set to work to turn the cottage into a mansion. As he was his own architect, the result was a strange mingling of styles.

The original cottage remained much as it was, with a thatched roof and whitewashed walls. But to the left, rose a round tower built quite in the mediaeval style, to the right stretched a two-story mansion with oriel windows, a terrace and Tudor battlements. At the back of this, the building suddenly changed to a bungalow with a tropical verandah, and the round tower stood at the end of a range of buildings built in the Roman fashion with sham marble pillars, and mosaic encrusted walls. Within, the house was equally eccentric. There was a Spanish patio, turned, for the sake of the climate, into a winter garden and roofed with glass. The dining-room was Jacobean, the drawing-room was furnished in the Louis Quatorze style, Mr. Hill's library was quite an old English room with casements and a low roof.