Friends I Have Made Part 19

"Oh! you'll find that in all the houses about here. It rises up the wall, you see."

"Yes, from bad building," I answered.

"But it's much worse at the house opposite," said the old lady.

"Where the tenant died?" I said.

"Yes," she answered innocently enough.

"Why, you seem anxious to let the house," I said smiling.

"Well, yes," said the old gentleman, combing his few hairs with one end of his spectacles. "You see, the agents like us to let the houses; and if we're in one very long--"

"He don't like it," said the old lady.

"Then you often have to change?"

"It all depends; sometimes we've been in houses where they've been let in a week."

"Not in new neighbourhoods," said the old lady; "people's shy of coming to the very new places. You see they're only just run up, and the roads ain't made."

"Ah!" said the old gentleman, "sometimes the roads ain't made till the houses are all let."

"And people often won't take the houses till the roads are made," said the old lady.

"So sometimes we're a year or two in a place. People are so particular about damp, you see," said the old gentleman.

"And many of the houses are damp?" I asked inquiringly.

"Well, ma'am, what can you expect," he replied confidentially, "seeing how things goes? Here's, say, a field here to-day, and the surveyor marks it out into roads. Then one speculative builder runs up a lot of carcases on it, and fails. Then another buys the carcases, and finishes 'em in a showy, flashy way; and then they put them at very low rents, to tempt people to take 'em."

"And raises the rents as soon as one or two tenants have been in them,"

said the old lady.

"It tempts people like," continued the old gentleman; "they see nice showy-looking houses in an open place, and they think they're healthy."

"And they're not?" I said.

The old man shrugged his shoulders.

"Healthy? No!" cried the old lady. "How can they be healthy, with the mortar and bricks all wet, and the rain perhaps been streaming into them for months before they were finished? Why, if you go and look in some of those big half-finished houses, just two streets off, you see the water lying in the kitchens and breakfast-rooms a foot deep. That's how he got his rheumatics." Here she nodded at her husband.

"Don't bother the lady about that, Mary," said the old man, mildly.

"You've lived in some of these very new damp places, then?"

"Well," said the old gentleman smiling, "beggars mustn't be choosers, you see. We have to take the house the agent has on hand."

"You take charge of a house, then, on condition of living rent-free?"

"Yes, ma'am, that's it," said the old lady smiling.

"And how long have you lived in this way?"

"Oh! close upon fifteen years, ma'am," replied the old gentleman; "but things are not so good as they were. More than once I've nearly had to take a place--much building as there is going on."

"Yes, and pay rent," said the old lady.

"You see it's the police," the old gentleman went on.

"The police?"

"Yes, the police," said the old lady. "The boys do so much mischief."

"Boys, you see, from the thick parts of London," said the old gentleman explaining. "Rough lads on Sundays. They get amongst the empty and unfinished houses, troops of them, to play pitch-and-toss, and they throw stones and break windows and slates."

"And knock down the plaster and bricks," added the old lady.

"Ah! they most levelled one wall close by," said the old gentleman.

"They're so fond of making seesaws of the wood, too," said the old lady.

"And splashing about in the pools of water," said the old gentleman.

"And the agents, on account of this, have took to having the police,"

said the old lady.

"To keep the boys away?" I asked.

"Yes; you see, it's the married police and their wives take charge of the houses, and when the boys know that there's policemen about, why, of course they stay away."

"But it makes it very bad for such as we," said the old lady.

"Fifteen years is a long time to live rent-free," I said smiling.

"Yes, ma'am, it is, and you see we have a deal to do for it. We have lots of people come to look at the houses before one's let."

"Specially women," chimed in the old gentleman. "There's some come regular, and do it, I s'pose, because they likes it. They look at all the houses in the neighbourhood, same as some other ladies always go to sales. They never buy anything; and _they_ never mean to take a house; but they come and look at 'em, all the same."

"But we always know them," said the old lady.

"Yes, they're easy enough to tell," chuckled the old man. And then, seeing me look inquiringly at him, he went on, "They finds fault with everything, ma'am. The hall's too narrow, or else too broad, and the staircase isn't the right shape. Then they want folding doors to the dining-room; or they don't want folding doors. Sometimes six bed-rooms is too many; some times eight ain't enough. And they always finds fault with the kitchen."

"And they always want a fresh paper in the dining-room," said the old lady chiming in; "and the drawing-room paper's too light; and we don't mind them a bit."

"No," chuckled the old gentleman; "we're used to them. We know, bless you!"

"And I suppose you felt that I did not want a house, eh?"