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the house, and yet it was known that there was
something wrong with their nephew.
But towards the spring Floris became so unruly
that no one in the street could fail to notice it.
He rang the bell at night after twelve o'clock, so
loudly that it could be heard houses away. Some-
times he stood outside the door for a while with his
friends, with noisy talk and loud laughter, and
Briemen, who always sat up late, pulled his blind
aside to look. Once he had called through the
window to them to be quiet, and one of the boys had
shouted back at him. On another occasion the
whole street was talking of the scandal, how a party
of louts, among them young Berkenrode, boys they
didn't even recognise, came rolling up with Thijs>
the druggist, who was too drunk to walk, and when
his wife came to the door to fetch him in, they had
hooted at her. There had been quarrelling in the
shop between Wouters, who had asked loudly
whether these disturbances at night couldn't be put
a stop to, and Werendonk, who answered calmly
and politely that he would not put up with being
called to task in his own house. And Mrs. Sanne,
now almost too infirm to walk, scoffed, saying that
Werendonk's idea of religion was a fine one—he
went to Church regularly, but had no authority over
that gad-about. Warner's wife told Stien what all
the neighbours knew, that two of the companions
with whom Floris went about, boys from an ale-