Snawdor's
bedroom at the rear. This plan, pursued day after day, with the general
understanding that Mrs. Snawdor was going to take a day off soon and
clean up, had resulted in a condition of indescribable chaos. As Mr.
Snawdor and the three younger children slept in the rear room at night,
and Mrs. Snawdor slept in it the better part of the day, the hour for
cleaning seldom arrived.
To-day as Nance stood in the doorway of this stronghold of dirt and
disorder, she paused, broom in hand. The floor, as usual, was littered
with papers and strings, the beds were unmade, the wash-stand and dresser
were piled high with a miscellaneous collection, and the drawers of each
stood open, disgorging their contents. On the walls hung three enlarged
crayons of bridal couples, in which the grooms were different, but the
bride the same. On the dusty window sill were bottles and empty spools,
broken glass chimneys, and the clock that ran ten minutes slow. The
debris not only filled the room, but spilled out into the fire-escape and
down the rickety iron ladders and flowed about the garbage barrels in the
passage below.
It was not this too familiar scene, however, that made Nance pause with
her hand on the door-knob and gaze open-mouthed into the room. It was the
sight of Mr. Snawdor sitting on the side of the bed with his back toward
her, wiping his little red-rimmed eyes on a clean pocket handkerchief,
and patting his trembling mouth with the hand that was not under the
quilt.
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