What does this mean in the Gift of the Magi?

Question

While the mistress of the house is gradually subsiding from the first stage to the second, take a look at the home. A furnished flat at $8 per week. It did not exactly beggar description, but it certain had that word on the lookout for the mendicancy squad.

Answer 1

She's moving from one mood to the other. The apartment was cheap and looked as though very poor people lived here.

https://www.auburn.edu/~vestmon/Gift_of_the_Magi.html