She had been told by her cousin, as they drove in a four-wheeled cab
through the depressing streets of a London suburb, that the family
consisted of his wife and a son and a daughter; that the son's name was
Joseph and the daughter's Isabel; that Joseph was a clerk in the city,
and that Isabel was about the same age as Ida.
"We are a very quiet family," Mr. Heron had said, "and you will no
doubt miss the space and grandeur of Heron Hall, but I trust we are
contented and happy, and that though our means are limited, our sphere
of usefulness is wider than that of some wealthier people. My wife is,
unfortunately, an invalid, and requires constant care and attention;
but I have no doubt she will find strength to bear any fresh burden
which Providence may see fit to put upon her. Though our circumstances
are comfortable, we are not surrounded by the luxuries which so often
prove a stumbling-block to weaker brethren. I trust you may be happy in
our humble home, and that you may find some opportunity of usefulness
in this new state of life to which you are called."
Ida tried to remember all this as she stood in the centre of the
drawing-room and looked round upon the modern but heavy and ugly
objects with which it was furnished.
The room was seedy and shabby, but with a different seediness and
shabbiness from that of Heron Hall; for there was an attempt to conceal
its loss of freshness with antimacassars, large in size and hideous of
pattern. A grim and ugly portrait of Mr. John Heron occupied a great
portion of one of the walls, and was confronted by a portrait, of a
similar size, of his wife, a middle-class woman of faded aspect and
languishing expression. The other pictures were of the type that one
usually sees in such houses; engravings printed from wornout plates,
and third-class lithographs. There was a large sofa covered with dirty
cretonne, and with a hollow in the middle showing that the spring had
"gone;" the centre-table was adorned by several well-known religious
books arranged at regular intervals. A cage containing a canary hung
between the curtains in the window, and the bird, a wretched-looking
animal--it was moulting--woke up at their entrance and shrilled in the
hateful manner peculiar to canaries. This depressing room was lit by
one gas-burner, which only permitted Ida to take in all that had been
described but vaguely and dimly.
She looked round aghast and with a sinking of the heart. She had never
been in any room like this before, and its lack of comfort, its
vulgarity, struck upon her strained nerves like a loud discordant note
in music; but its owner looked round complacently and turned the gas a
little higher, as he said: "I will go and fetch your cousin. Won't you sit down?"