tic in Howland
Street. The house was clean, decent, and quiet for a wonder. Thither
he removed himself and his belongings. He had parted with all but the
absolutely essential, among which he reckoned all Lucia's books and a
few of his own. He had stripped himself for this last round with
Fortune. He would come out of it all right if he wrote nothing but
articles, lived on ten shillings a week and sold the articles; which,
meant that in the weeks when no articles were sold he must live on
less. It meant, too, that he must make his own bed, sweep his own
room, and cook his own meals when they were cooked at all; that to
have clean linen he must pay the price of many meals, as he counted
meals.

The attic was not a nice place in July and August. Though the house
was quiet, there flowed through it, in an incessant, suffocating,
sickly stream, the untamed smells and noises of the street. For the
sake of peace he took to working through the night and going to bed in
the day-time; an eccentricity which caused him to be regarded with
some suspicion by his neighbours. In spite of their apparent decency
he had judged it expedient to keep his door locked, a lack of
confidence that wounded them. The lodger in the garret next to his
went so far as to signify by laughter her opinion of his unfriendly
secrecy. Her own door was never shut except when he shut it. This
interference with her liberty she once violently resented, delivering
herself of a jet of oratory that bore with far-fetched fancy on his
parentage and profession. For her threshold was her vantage ground.
Upon it she stood and waited, listening for the footsteps of her luck.

It was a marvel to him how under these conditions he could turn out
the amount of work he did. For some nights were as noisy as the day.
There was no sort of repose about his next-door neighbour. At times
she coughed all night, at times she sang. Or again, by sounds of
sobbing he gathered that the poor wretch was not prospering in her
trade. Still, there were long and blessed intervals of peace when she
roamed farther afield; intervals which might or might not be prolonged
by alcoholic stupor after her return. It may have been owing to these
influences that he began to notice a decided deterioration in his
prose. Hanson had returned his last article. He had worked poor
Hanson's geniality for all it was worth, and he felt that in common
prudence he must withdraw from the _Courier_ for a season. Mean