midday
Less than a year earlier my homecomings had been singularly different ; a dark , cold room in a malodorous house , with very possibly a drunken couple brawling on the landing outside . But there were tears in Fanny 's eyes . The mother was in one of her vicious tempers , it seemed , and had gone to bed in her basement room with the keys of larder and kitchen , and a bottle of gin . The daughter 's last meal had been whatever she could get for midday dinner . And it was now nine o'clock in the evening . ` Just you wait there . Do n't stir from where you arc .