Euphemia and I
thoroughly investigated this matter, and I know that what I say is
a fact.
We tried all the plans. When we advertised, we had about a dozen
admirable answers, but in these, although everything seemed to
suit, the amount of rent was not named. (None of those in which
the rent was named would do at all.) And when I went to see the
owners, or agents of these suitable houses, they asked much higher
rents than those mentioned in the unavailable answers--and this,
notwithstanding the fact that they always asserted that their terms
were either very reasonable or else greatly reduced on account of
the season being advanced. (It was now the fifteenth of May.)
Euphemia and I once wrote a book,--this was just before we were
married,--in which we told young married people how to go to
housekeeping and how much it would cost them. We knew all about
it, for we had asked several people. Now the prices demanded as
yearly rental for small furnished houses, by the owners and agents
of whom I have been speaking, were, in many cases, more than we had
stated a house could be bought and furnished for!
The advertisements of other people did not serve any better. There
was always something wrong about the houses when we made close
inquiries, and the trouble was generally in regard to the rent.
With agents we had a little better fortune. Euphemia sometimes
went with me on my expeditions to real estate offices, and she
remarked that these offices were always in the basement, or else
you had to go up to them in an elevator.
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