midnight
Rhona 's whole family was engaged in sweat-work . They lived in a miserable tenement over in Hester Street , where her mother had been toiling from dawn until midnight with the needle , with her tiny brother helping to sew on buttons , `` finishing '' daily a dozen pairs of pants , and making -- _ thirty cents _ . Myra was amazed . `` Thirty cents -- dawn till midnight ! Impossible ! '' And then her father -- who worked all day in a sweatshop . `` And you -- what did you do ? ''