Then he got out of bed, and had such a washing and scrubbing as he had never had before. He was washed from head to foot, and dressed in the new clothes, and when he looked in the glass he saw himself just as he had been before he left Miss Lawson's school at Ramsgate.
'Now,' said Mrs. Wilmot, 'I think you may as well come to see your father and Winnie.'
'Are they here?' he asked.
'Oh yes,' she explained, 'I sent to tell them last night, and they arrived early this morning. Not both together, because we left Winnie with Aunt Ellen at Chesterham, whilst father went to look for you one way and I went another.'
'Then you were really looking for me?' cried Jimmy.
'Why, of course we were,' she answered. 'We knew you were walking about the country dressed as a little clown. But come,' she said, 'because your father is anxious to see you.'
'I should like to see him too,' said Jimmy. 'I hope he's as nice as you are,' he cried as they left the bedroom.
'He is ever so much nicer,' was the quiet answer.
'I don't think he could be,' said Jimmy, as his mother turned the handle. Then he remembered what the boys had said at school.
'Winnie isn't really black, is she?' he asked.