The Craze of Christina — page 49: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The Craze of Christina. 45 Hall was by no means “‘beastly’’; it was a very nice house indeed; nor was Docker, strictly speaking, ‘‘diabolical’’; he was on the contrary exceedingly human. The young man came back to find that the works, which he had hoped would have pro- gressed considerably during his absence, had on the contrary apparently come to a complete standstill. He could not make out in fact that anything had been done at all during his ab- sence; George Jones, it appeared, had been up in London too, ‘‘on business,’ Docker said—the foreman had been ill, some of the carpenters had been called away to another job, the plas- terers had been on strike—plasterers, he was given to understand, were rare creatures, and being aware of their intrinsic value, presumed upon that knowledge to “‘go out’’ frequently. The paperers had consequently been at a stand- still, and the plumbers who alone had remained in possession, had plumbed so infamously that all their work had had to be undone, and begun over egain. Clifford came to the conclusion after listening to these details, that to go away during the res- toration of the house was evidently neta pay- ing proceeding. For the first time as he sat down to eat his Comichooksico