The Boarding House

After that they lived apart. She went to the priest and got a separation from

After that they lived apart. She went to the priest and got a separation from him with care of the children. She would give him neither money nor food nor house-room; and so he was obliged to enlist himself as a sheriff's man. He was a shabby stooped little drunkard with a white face and a white white eyebrows, above his little eyes, which were veined and raw; and all day long he sat in the bailiffs room,waiting to be put on a job. Mrs. Mooney, who had taken what remained of her money out of the butcher business and set up a boarding house in Street, was a big imposing woman. Her house had a floating population made up of tourists from Liverpool and the Isle of Man and occasionally artistes from the music halls. Its resident population was made up of clerks from the city. She governed the house cunningly and firmly, knew when to give credit, when to be stern and when to let things pass. All the resident young men spoke of her as The Madam.