“Well for mercy’s sake!” gasped Jess, gazing at her chum in wonder. “Can you beat that? If this is the same family——”
Laura stayed her with a look. “We’ll see,” said Mother Wit. “Lead on, Maggie. We’ll see your mother, anyway.”
CHAPTER XXII—MRS. PLORNISH
Governor Street was just as dirty and squalid as any other tenement-house street in the poorer section of a middle-class city. The street-cleaning department had given up all hope before they reached Governor Street, and the middle of the way was a series of ridges and mountains of heaped-up, dirty, frozen snow.
The snow had been cleaned from the sidewalks, and the gutters freed so that the melting ice could run off by way of the sewers when the sun was kind; but the way to Number 93 was not a pleasant one to travel.
However, Laura and Jess, with little Maggie, reached the door in question in a few minutes, A puff of steamy air—the essence of countless washings—met the girls as the lower door was pushed open. That is the only way the long and barren halls were heated—by the steam from the wash-boilers. For Number 93 Governor Street was one of those tenement houses which seem always to be in a state of being washed, and laundered, and cleaned up; yet which never show many traces of cleanliness, after all.
“We live on the top floor,” said Maggie, volunteering her first remark since starting homeward.
“That doesn’t scare us,” said Laura, cheerfully. “Lead on, MacDuff!”
“No. My name’s Plornish,” said this very literal—and seemingly dull—little girl.
“Very well, Maggie MacDuff Plornish!” laughed Mother Wit. “We follow you.”