A Jewess opened the door, her sleeves rolled to the elbows, her face plump and good-natured. She smiled pleasantly.
"Would you mind our coming in to look at your rooms?" he asked.
"What for?" she said.
"Why, I used to live here when I was a child, and I'd like to show this lady the place."
"If you want to, you can, I suppose. It ain't much to look at now, though. We have to take what we can get, down here."
Her curiosity was appeased by the coin which Granthope slipped into her hand, and she sat down to her sewing phlegmatically, looking up occasionally with little interest.
The place was, of course, much changed. The windows were washed, the floor scrubbed and partly covered with rag rugs. It was well furnished and well aired. Granthope pointed but the little chamber where Madam Grant had slept, where his own bed had been, and, finally, the closet from which he had first spied upon her. Clytie looked about silently, much moved, and trying to bring back her own recollections of the place.
"If I close my eyes, I can almost see it as it was," she said. "I can almost get that strange feeling I had when I came here. If I could be here for a while alone I think I could see things. I'd like to go into the closet again. Let's see if the crack is still in the door."
It was still there. She asked permission to go inside, and the Jewess rather uncomfortably agreed. The place was filled with clothing; it was close and odorous; the shelves were filled with boxes, rags and household belongings. Clytie went in rather timidly.
"Go over where I sat in the front room, that day," she said. "I want to look through the crack, as you did. I'd like to be locked in, too, but the key is gone."