Come out of the Kitchen! by Alice Duer Miller

ELIOT'S large library, to which Crane and his party were led on their arrival, looked as only a room can look which has been occupied for several hours by a number of idle men. All the sofa cushions were on the floor, all the newspapers were on the sofas, cigarette ashes were everywhere, and the air was heavy with a combination of wood and tobacco smoke, everybody's hair was ruffled, as if they had all been sitting on the back of their heads, and Eliot, himself, now standing commandingly on the hearth-rug, was saying:

"Yes, and he did not have a sound leg when he bought him, and that must have been in 1909, for I remember it was the last year I went to Melton -- " He broke off reluctantly to greet his guests.