*

Have you ever tried to find a spare bed in a town where there seems to
be not a spare bed to be had? I left my belongings in an ice cream
store and followed every clue, with a helpful hint from the one
policeman, or the drug store man, or a fat, soiled grandmother who
turned me down because they were already sleeping on top of one
another in her house. In between I dropped on a grassy hillside and
watched Our Bleachery baseball team play a Sunday afternoon game with
the Colored Giants. We won.

And then I took up the hunt again, finally being guided by the Lord to
the abode of the sisters Weston--two old maids, combined age one
hundred and forty-nine years, who took boarders. Only there were no
more to take. The Falls was becoming civilized. Improvements were
being installed in most of the houses. Boarders, which meant mainly
school-teachers, preferred a house with Improvements. The abode of the
sisters Weston had none. It was half a company house, with a pump in
the kitchen which drew up brown water of a distressing odor.

The sisters Weston had worked in the overall factory in their earlier
years, hours 7 to 6, wages five dollars a week, paid every five to six
weeks. Later they tried dressmaking; later still, boarders. I belonged
to the last stage of all--they no longer took boarders, they took a
boarder. Mr. Welsh from the electrical department in the bleachery,
whose wife was in Pennsylvania on a visit to her folks, being sickly
and run down, as seemed the wont of wives at the Falls, took his meals
at our boarding house, when he was awake for them. Every other week
Mr. Welsh worked night shift.

My belongings were installed in the room assigned me, and the younger
of the sisters Weston, seventy-three, sat stiffly but kindly in a
chair. "Now about the room rent...?" she faltered. Goodness! yes! My
relief at finding a place to sleep in after eleven turn-downs was so
great that I had completely neglected such a little matter as what the
room might cost me.

"What do you charge?" I asked.

"What do you feel you can pay? We want you should have some money left
each week after your board's paid. What do you make at the
bleachery?"

My conscience fidgeted within me a bit at that. "I'd rather you
charged me just what you think the room and board are worth to you,
not what you think I can pay."

"Well, we used to get eight dollars a week for room and board. It's
worth that."

It is cheaper to live than die in