The landlady had raised the rent.
Ikey could have screamed with laughter over the situation—if only the matter were not so vital.
"This'll make the thirteenth move for you, Ikey, my love, since the eighteenth of April—and the thirteenth move is bound to be unlucky. But you'll have to go, sure as Fate; for you can't stand another raise. The Wandering Jew gentleman takes the road again."
She pursed her lips as she said it. She had invented the appelation for herself after nine moves in three months. "I don't know what his name really was," she confessed—there was no one else to talk to, no one she cared for, so she talked, sub voice, to herself—"but it must have been Ikey. I'm sure it was Ikey—and that I look just like him." And deriving much comfort from this witticism, she went on her way.
"Ikey, the Wandering Jew, on the move again," she repeated. "But where to move to, that is the question. It's funny what a difference money makes"—her eyebrows went up—"or rather, lack of it. I've never considered that until recently."
Then her eyes fell on her shoes.
They had been very swagger little shoes in the beginning—Ikey had made rather a specialty of footgear—but they were her "escape" shoes; and their looks told the tale of their wanderings. Also, she had had no others since.
She wriggled her toes.
"You'll be poking through before long, looking at the stars," she told them severely. "Imagine your excitement."
And her suit.