The street in front was being repaired.

It had been said by imbecile residents of the vicinity that the paving was never allowed to remain down for a sufficient time to be invalided by the tramping millions, but that it was kept perpetually stacked in little mountains through the unceasing vigilance of a virtuous and heroic city government, which insisted that everything should be repaired.

The alderman for the district had sometimes asked indignantly of his fellow-members why this street had not been repaired, and they, aroused, had at once ordered it to be repaired.

Moreover, shopkeepers, whose stables were adjacent, placed trucks and other vehicles strategically in the darkness.

Into this tangled midnight Hawker conducted Florinda.