Next to Uncle Wally’s furnace room was the laundry with the washtubs, an ironing board and a mangle in it. It was always filled with the smell of steaming Fels Naphtha soap and of wet woolens. The children were frightened of being caught in the mangle, as Mrs. Myers was always warning them, but could not be kept out when the tubs were emptied to drain off the cement floor and the opportunity for wading barefoot was at hand. Grandma padded in and out in the bedroom slippers her aching feet demanded, telling Mary to hurry, hurry, there was plenty work upstairs waiting. Roomers sometimes came down with a shirt or nightdress, calling out, “Put this in, Mary, will you? It won’t cost any extra, now that you’ve got the suds there.” The children had learned that in any spot where women were at work they were bound to scold about everything. Another point was that any time women were at work meant a clear field for mischief or adventure in other quarters. It was the time to idle away with ball and jacks on the front stoop until the ice cream sandwich man could be seen wheeling his cart far down the street. Then Lena delegated Marcia to creep into Grandma’s room and get two pennies from the saucer of change on the walnut highboy. Lena wouldn’t get it herself, because she said it was stealing. Money secured, they raced down the street with a pack of other screaming children who burst out of alleys, gutter drains, and thin air, holding high their pennies in tight fists. The fresh smell of the lake was in the wind, and steamer smoke, train smoke, a smell of wheat dust and coffee warehouses, threaded with the dim far-off clamor of the docks.

“I wish we could stay here for good,” Marcia said sincerely. “It’s fun doing as we please.”

“I don’t like Mrs. M. and Mrs. B. always bossing us,” objected Lena. “Besides I want to stay with Papa and Florrie. I want to live in London Junction again and see Mary Evelyn.”

Whenever they asked Papa if he had found the housekeeper he told them to hush up and stop bothering a busy man, all tired out from trying to make a living for them. On his rare visits he sat on the porch with Mrs. M. and Mrs. B., chuckling and teasing them. When a new roomer brought out a guitar they heard Papa singing to them, “Our little farm was small; it would not support us all.” Mrs. M. and Mrs. B. both commented many times on what a card Mr. Willard was, and he certainly would have no trouble getting a mother for his little ones. Mrs. M. said three was, to her mind, the ideal number of children, as they sort of looked after themselves, leaving the parents, who might be still full of life, to go on good times together. Or for that matter the children could be left a good deal with their relations. Mrs. B. said that from Mr. Willard’s dressiness she judged he made a nice little salary and could afford help to look after the children, leaving the new mother free to shop or go to her card clubs and keep up appearances. Both agreed that those little girls certainly needed a mother’s care. But when Ed Hartwell was with Papa the two men made a beeline for downtown and spent very little time with the roomers.