"I should charge eighteen dollars for two in the back parlor, and I would let the hall bedroom to two for fourteen—my table board is six dollars apiece without a room," said she of the jets.
"No; we shall pay only fourteen for each of the rooms we are looking for," said Jessamy, whose courage was rising.
"Oh, I couldn't consider it," said the landlady, sternly. "Still, there are two lovely rooms on the top floor you might have for that. The furnace does not go up there, so they would be heated by a stove. You wouldn't mind looking after your own fires?"
"I should mind my mother going up so many flights; still, we will look at the rooms," said Jessamy. The long climb to the top of the house brought them to two rooms together, though not connected; sunny, rather cheerful, and, though plainly furnished, not so ugly as the first ones.
"We are not willing to go up so high, but we will let you know if we consider them further," said Jessamy.
"I should require references as to respectability," said the landlady, firmly.
"I am glad to hear it; so should I," said Jessamy, and departed, cutting short a list of distinguished people who had once boarded there.
Three days of weary search brought forth no better results. The main difference in the places the discouraged girls visited was that in one house the stairs went up on the right side of the hall, in another on the left; that in one the furniture of the rooms was black walnut, in another oak—when it was maple or mahogany it was beyond the Wyndhams' limit of price.
These days taught the three girls—for Barbara had joined the others—more of life than their entire years so far had shown them, and the fruit of this tree of knowledge was bitter indeed.
They were unable to find anything within their means better than the upper rooms in the West Thirty —— Street house, and decided to risk the four flights—five including the basement—and the dubious prospect of the care of their own fires.