{"product_id":"2940013410053","title":"THE FORTUNATE YOUTH","description":"CHAPTER I\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePAUL KEGWORTHY lived with his mother, Mrs. Button, his stepfather, Mr.\u003cbr\u003eButton, and six little Buttons, his half brothers and sisters. His was\u003cbr\u003enot an ideal home; it consisted in a bedroom, a kitchen and a scullery\u003cbr\u003ein a grimy little house in a grimy street made up of rows of exactly\u003cbr\u003esimilar grimy little houses, and forming one of a hundred similar\u003cbr\u003estreets in a northern manufacturing town. Mr. and Mrs. Button worked in\u003cbr\u003ea factory and took in as lodgers grimy single men who also worked in\u003cbr\u003efactories. They were not a model couple; they were rather, in fact, the\u003cbr\u003escandal of Budge Street, which did not itself enjoy, in Bludston, a\u003cbr\u003ereputation for holiness. Neither was good to look upon. Mr. Button, who\u003cbr\u003ewas Lancashire bred and born, divided the yearnings of his spirit\u003cbr\u003ebetween strong drink and dog-fights. Mrs. Button, a viperous Londoner,\u003cbr\u003eyearned for noise. When Mr. Button came home drunk he punched his wife\u003cbr\u003eabout the head and kicked her about the body, while they both exhausted\u003cbr\u003ethe vocabulary of vituperation of North and South, to the horror and\u003cbr\u003eedification of the neighbourhood. When Mr. Button was sober Mrs. Button\u003cbr\u003echastised little Paul. She would have done so when Mr. Button was\u003cbr\u003edrunk, but she had not the time. The periods, therefore, of his\u003cbr\u003emother's martyrdom were those of Paul's enfranchisement. If he saw his\u003cbr\u003estepfather come down the street with steady gait, he fled in terror; if\u003cbr\u003ehe saw him reeling homeward he lingered about with light and joyous\u003cbr\u003eheart.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe brood of young Buttons was fed spasmodically and clad at random,\u003cbr\u003ebut their meals were regular and their raiment well assorted compared\u003cbr\u003ewith Paul's. Naturally they came in for clouts and thumps like all the\u003cbr\u003echildren in Budge Street; it was only Paul who underwent organized\u003cbr\u003echastisement. The little Buttons often did wrong; but in the mother's\u003cbr\u003eeyes Paul could never do right. In an animal way she was fond of the\u003cbr\u003echildren of Button, and in a way equally animal she bore a venomous\u003cbr\u003edislike to the child of Kegworthy. Who and what Kegworthy had been\u003cbr\u003eneither Paul nor any inhabitant of Bludston knew. Once the boy\u003cbr\u003einquired, and she broke a worn frying-pan over his head. Kegworthy,\u003cbr\u003ewhoever he might have been, was wrapt in mystery. She had appeared in\u003cbr\u003ethe town when Paul was a year old, giving herself out as a widow. That\u003cbr\u003eshe was by no means destitute was obvious from the fact that she at\u003cbr\u003eonce rented the house in Budge Street, took in lodgers, and lived at\u003cbr\u003eher ease. Button, who was one of the lodgers, cast upon her the eyes of\u003cbr\u003edesire and married her. Why she married Button she could never\u003cbr\u003edetermine. Perhaps she had a romantic idea--and there is romance even\u003cbr\u003ein Budge Street-that Button would support her. He very soon shattered\u003cbr\u003eany such illusion by appropriating the remainder of her fortune and\u003cbr\u003ekicking her into the factory with hobnailed boots. It would be wrong to\u003cbr\u003esay that Mrs. Button did not complain; she did. She rent the air of\u003cbr\u003eBudge Street with horrible execration; but she went to the factory,\u003cbr\u003ewhere, save for the intervals of retirement rendered necessary by the\u003cbr\u003ebirths of the little Buttons, she was contented enough to stay.","brand":"SAP","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47145746694384,"sku":"2940013410053","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940013410053_p0.jpg?v=1763580542","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940013410053","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}