THE LOST PRINCE





I

THE NEW LODGERS AT NO. 7 PHILIBERT PLACE


There are many dreary and dingy rows of ugly houses in certain parts of
London, but there certainly could not be any row more ugly or dingier
than Philibert Place. There were stories that it had once been more
attractive, but that had been so long ago that no one remembered the
time. It stood back in its gloomy, narrow strips of uncared-for, smoky
gardens, whose broken iron railings were supposed to protect it from the
surging traffic of a road which was always roaring with the rattle of
busses, cabs, drays, and vans, and the passing of people who were
shabbily dressed and looked as if they were either going to hard work or
coming from it, or hurrying to see if they could find some of it to do
to keep themselves from going hungry. The brick fronts of the houses
were blackened with smoke, their windows were nearly all dirty and hung
with dingy curtains, or had no curtains at all; the strips of ground,
which had once been intended to grow flowers in, had been trodden down
into bare earth in which even weeds had forgotten to grow. One of them
was used as a stone-cutter's yard, and cheap monuments, crosses, and
slates were set out for sale, bearing inscriptions beginning with
"Sacred to the Memory of." Another had piles of old lumber in it,
another exhibited second-hand furniture, chairs with unsteady legs,