Ebook The Heron Nest

As you opened the door your nostrils were assailed by the combined odor of stale soapsuds and many, many boiled dinners. The narrow halls had been steamed over and over again, and the woodwork, the tattered paper on the walls, even the broken plastering itself, was saturated with it.

Although he was quite used to these smells, and to the squalling of the children on the staircase, and the bullying of half-drunken men, and the wrangling of hopeless women, it all struck Billy Herron rather harshly as he came in at dusk. He was obliged to take breath at each landing as he climbed the stairs, and when some monkey of a boy, lying in wait for him at a particularly dark corner, knocked the stick out of his hand and ran whooping and clattering down the flight, Billy had to wait a moment to compose his features before recovering the cane and hobbling on to the right-hand door at the end of the hall, which opened into the Herron kitchen.

He waited there for a moment, too, with his hand on the knob of the door. There was a rule that he, and Jack, and Pearl Mary, seldom failed to observe. They had agreed never to come in at night without a smile, and a cheerful word, or a song on their lips, or a funny story to tell. Jack got his stories out of the paper, and sometimes told the same one twice. Pearl Mary could usually find something to relate about the furshop in which she worked — something which had happened during the day — which was interesting and sprightly. But more than that was expected of Billy.

The hours were gloomy enough at home for the three elders of the family. But Mr. Herron, and Granny, and Aunt Nannie, were really only the elders by courtesy; Jack, Billy, and Pearl Mary shouldered all the responsibility.