Robin of Sun Court by Eleanora H. Stooke

SUN COURT was generally spoken of as one of the worst slums in Plymouth. Its name had been ill-chosen, for the sunlight only peeped into it early in the morning, and then only for an hour or so; during the rest of the day the place was dull and cheerless in the extreme. The houses surrounding the court were squalid and dilapidated for the most part. But some few looked better kept; and decorating a certain downstair window, on the May morning on which this story opens, was a wallflower in full bloom in a pot-an object of beauty in the midst of much which was unsightly, and, as the sun's rays fell on the streaky, golden-brown blooms, their delicious scent seemed to grow stronger until their fragrance filled the air.

It was said that many of the shadiest characters in Plymouth lived in Sun Court. It may have been so; but as ill weeds cannot altogether choke the growth of some hardy flowers, so were there those in Sun Court who rose above the circumstances of their lives and kept straight and honest in spite of their surroundings. One of these was the owner of the wallflower in the pot, an old cobbler called Jasper Blamey, who spent most of his days at his cobbler's bench, exactly inside the downstair window of his house.