It had been once a dwelling of some well-to-do family of the days gone by; of some merchant, whose ventures went out and came in at those wharves below, whence the air swept up pure, then, with its salt smell, into the streets.  The rooms were fairly large; Luclarion spent money out of her own little property, that had been growing by care and saving till she could spare from it, in doing her share toward having it all made as sweet and clean as mortar and whitewash and new pine-boards and paint and paper could make it.  All that was left of the old, they scoured with carbolic soap; and she had the windows opened, and in the chimneys that had been swept of their soot she had clear fires made and kept burning for days.

Then she put her new, plain furnishings into her own two down-stairs rooms; and the Gallilees brought in theirs above; and beside them, she found two decent families,—­a German paper-hanger’s, and that of a carpenter at one of the theatres, whose wife worked at dressmaking,—­to take the rest.  Away up, at the very top, she had the wide, large room that Hazel spoke of, and a smaller one to which she climbed to sleep, for the sake of air as near heaven as it could be got.

One of her lower-rooms was her living and housekeeping room; the other she turned into a little shop, in which she sold tapes and needles and cheap calicoes and a few ribbons; and kept a counter on the opposite side for bread and yeast, gingerbread, candy, and the like.  She did this partly because she must do something to help out the money for her living and her plans, and partly to draw the women and children in.  How else could she establish any relations between herself and them, or get any permanent hold or access?  She had “turned it all over in her mind,” she said; “and a tidy little shop with fair, easy prices, was the very thing, and a part of just what she came down there to do.”

She made real, honest, hop-raised bread, of sweet flour that she gave ten dollars a barrel for; it took a little more than a pint, perhaps, to make a tea loaf; that cost her three cents; she sold her loaf for four, and it was better than they could get anywhere else for five.  Then, three evenings in a week, she had hot muffins, or crumpets, home-made; (it was the subtle home touch and flavor that she counted on, to carry more than a good taste into their mouths, even a dim notion of home sweetness and comfort into their hearts;) these first,—­a quart of flour at five cents, two eggs at a cent apiece, and a bit of butter, say three cents more, with three cents worth of milk, made an outlay of fifteen cents for a dozen and a half; so she sold them for ten cents a dozen, and the like had never been tasted or dreamed of in all that region round about; no, nor I dare almost to say, in half the region round about Republic Avenue either, where they cannot get Luclarion Grapps to cook.

The crumpets were cheaper; they were only bread-sponge, baked on a griddle; they were large, and light and tender; a quart of flour would make ten; she gave the ten for seven cents.