Another stranger to-day! And it wasn’t only the dear light that made the difference. John Converse might have been another person from the man of yesterday. He was dressed well,—almost elegantly. Certainly his suit, though it had a sack coat, was of fine material and good make and he wore a silk shirt and jaunty tie as if he were used to such informal elegance; and all the accessories were in keeping down to his neat shoes. He was not less thin nor pale—his face was almost cadaverous in the stronger light. But his eyes were merry and full of life, his rather large, thin-lipped mouth puckered with amusement at her wonderment, and there was a boyish eagerness about him that was flattering and very grateful to the girl’s perturbed spirit.
They shook hands gravely.
“It is more than good of you to come,” he said.
Alice Lorraine gave a little cry.
“Why, what have you done!” she exclaimed and looked about her as if frightened.
“Won’t you sit down and take in the magnificence at your ease?” he asked with a whimsical charm which seemed native to him. And Alice dropped into the large and comfortable wooden chair he indicated which was not only free from dust but had apparently been scrubbed clean.
Likewise the whole place. The room had been cleared of rubbish and transformed by the magic of strong, eager hands and soap and water to a quaintly attractive sitting-room. The bareness added to its apparent size. Odd bits of hand-made furniture were disposed gracefully about and every natural comeliness made the most of. Even the stairway added something to the general attractiveness. A bit of old rug lay before it and another at the door. The windows had a strip of dark cloth above for a blind and a white curtain over the lower sash. A small sheet-iron stove, still rusty, but clean, warmed the place and held a tiny kettle in which the water was boiling. A stand in the corner was covered by a white tea cloth, apparently just out of the shop, and held a tea pot and two cups, which were also new and gaudily pretty, and a plate of sweet biscuit.
“O Mr. Converse, you are a wizard surely!” cried the girl. “I really believe that you could turn yourself into whatever you wished. You could be an old gypsy woman or a fat man with bright-red hair and could walk the streets of Farleigh by day.”
He laughed. “It was soap and water and elbow grease that did this. I am afraid they wouldn’t presto-change me so easily.”
Then suddenly he paled. “Nevertheless, I have seen the time when soap and water might have worked wonders with me,” he declared bitterly. Alice looked at him in consternation.