There were
very few houses in which the air was at all tolerable; in many
instances the vilest odours hung about the open door-ways. To pass
out of Elm Court into the wider streets around was like a change to
the freshness of woods and fields. And the sources of this miasma
were only too obvious.
The larger houses which made up Litany Lane had underground cellars;
in the court there were fortunately no such retreats. On entering
one of these former houses, the two were aware of an especially
offensive odour rising from below the stairs. Pursuing, however,
their plan of beginning at the garrets, they went up together. In
the room at the top they came upon a miserable spectacle. On
something which, for want of another name, was probably called a
bed, there lay a woman either already dead or in a state of coma,
and on the floor sat two very young children, amusing themselves
with a dead kitten, their only toy. Mr. Woodstock bent over the
woman and examined her. He found that she was breathing, though in a
slow and scarcely perceptible way; her eyes were open, but expressed
no consciousness. The slightly-parted lips were almost black, and
here and there on her face there seemed to be a kind of rash.
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