d heated her "flats" upon
the coals, she was met with a torrent of abuse, and the assurance
that she "might get somebody else to save her old rags with their
apurns, an' iron five white skirts and tin pairs o' undersleeves a
week for two women, at three dollars an' a half. She had heard
enough about the place or iver she kim intil it, an' the bigger fool
she iver to iv set her fut inside the dooers."

That was it. It came to that pass, now. They "heard about the place
before iver they kim intil it." The Argenter name was up. There was
no getting out of the bog-mire. Sylvie ran the gauntlet of the
village refuse, and had to go to Boston to the intelligence offices.
By this time she hadn't a kitchen or a bedroom fit to show a decent
servant into. They came, and looked, and went away; half-dozens of
them. The stove was burnt out; there was a hole through into the
oven; nothing but an entire new one would do, and a new one would
cost forty dollars. Poor Sylvie toiled and worried; she went to Mrs.
Ingraham and the Miss Goodwyns, and Sabina Galvin, for advice; she
made ash-paste and cemented up the breaches, she hired a woman by
the day, put out washing, and bought bread at the bakehouse. All
this time, Mrs. Argenter had her white skirts and her ruffled
underclothing to be done up. "What could she do? She hadn't any
plain things, and she couldn't get new, and she must be clean."

At New Year's, they owed three hundred dollars that they could not
pay, beside the quarter's rent. They had to take it out of their
little invested capital; they sold ten shares of railroad stock at a
poor time; it brought them eight hundred and seventy-five dollars.
They bought their new stove, and some other things; they hired, at
last, two girls for the winter, at three dollars and two and a half,
respectively; this was a saving to what they had been doing, and
they must get through the cold weather somehow. Besides, Mrs.
Argenter was now seriously out of health. She had had nothing to do
but to fall sick under her troubles, and she had honestly and
effectually done it.

But how should they manage another year, and another? How long would
they have any income, if such a piece was to be taken out of the
principal every six months?

In the spring, Mrs. Argenter declared it was of no use; they must
give up and go to board. They ought to have done it in the first
place. Plenty of people got along so with no more than they had. A
cheap place in t