had to maintain herself and children.

Fan went out; but by-and-by recovering a little courage, and urged by
need, she went into other shops, into all the shops in that mean little
street at last, but nobody wanted her, and in one or two instances she
was ordered out in sharp tones and followed by sharp eyes lest she should
carry off something concealed under her shawl.

Then she wandered on again, and at length finding a quiet spot, she sat
down to rest on a doorstep. The pale October sunshine which had been with
her up till now deserted her; it was growing cold and grey, and at last,
shivering and faint, she got up and walked aimlessly on once more,
resolving to go into the next shop she should come to, and to speak to
the next woman she should see standing at her door, with the hope of
finding someone at last to take her in and give her food and a place to
lie down in. But on coming to the shop she would pass on; and when she
saw a woman standing outside her door, with keen hard eyes looking her
from head to foot, she would drop her own and walk on; and at last,
through very weariness, she began to lose that painful apprehension of
the cold night spent out of doors; even her hunger seemed to leave her;
she wanted only to sit down and fall asleep and remember no more. By-and-
by she found herself again in the Harrow Road, but her brain was
confused, so that she did not know whether she was going east or west. It
was growing colder now and darker, and a grey mist was forming in the
air, and she could find no shelter anywhere from the cold and mud and
mist, and from the eyes of the passers-by that seemed to look so
pitilessly at her. The sole of one of her shoes was worn through, and the
cold flag-stones of the footway and the mud of the streets made her foot
numb, so that she could scarcely lift it. Near Paddington Green--for she
had been for some time walking back towards the Edgware Road--she paused