Jeannette spent a great deal of time wondering about her family. First, there was her precious father. _He_ belonged to her. His speech was different from that of Mollie, her stepmother. It differed, too, from the rough speech of the other fishermen that sometimes dried their nets on the dock, or came there to _make_ nets. Even Old Captain, who lived in part of an old freight car on the shore near the smoke-stack, and who was very gentle and polite to little girls, was less careful in his speech than was Léon Duval. Her father's manners were _very_ nice indeed. Jeanne could see that they sometimes surprised persons who came to buy fish. Sometimes, when the old grandmother wished to be particularly offensive, she called Jeanne's father "a gentleman." Old Captain, too, had assured her that Léon Duval was a gentleman. No one, however, accused Mollie of being a lady. Slipshod as to speech, untidy, unwashed, uneducated, and most appallingly lazy, Mollie shifted the burden of her children upon Jeanne, who had cared for, in turn, each of the four red-headed babies. Fortunately, Jeanne liked babies. Mollie and her mother, Mrs. Shannon, did the housework, with much assistance from the children. In the evening Mr. Duval sat apart, in the small room next to the fish-shed, with his book. He read a great many books, some written in French, some in English. He obtained them from the city library. He read by the light of a lamp carefully filled and trimmed by his own neat hands. This tiny room, with no floor but the planking of the dock, with only rough boards, over which newspapers had been pasted, for sidewalls and ceiling; with no furniture but a single cot, a small trunk, a large box and three smaller ones, was always scrupulously clean. It was Léon Duval's own room. Like Léon himself, it was small and absolutely neat. Jeannette and Old Captain were the only two other persons permitted to enter that room. In it the little girl had learned to read, to do small problems in arithmetic, even to gain some knowledge of history and geography. She had never gone to school. First, it was too far. Next, Mollie had needed her to help with the children. Besides she had had no clothes. Mollie's _own_ children had no clothes. To do Mollie justice, she was quite as kind to Jeannette as to her own youngsters. In fact, she was kinder, because she admired the little girl's very pleasing face, her soft black eyes, and the dark hair that _almost_ curled. She _liked_ Jeanne. She was anything but a _cruel_ stepmother. She had proved a poor one, nevertheless. Good-natured Mollie was thoroughly and completely lazy. She wouldn't work. She said she couldn't work. Mollie's ill-tempered mother was just about as shiftless; but for her there was some excuse. She was crippled with rheumatism. She was also exceedingly cross. Jeannette was fond of Mollie, but she disliked her stepgrandmother very much indeed. Most everybody did.