I agreed. “How many competitors?”
“Forty-three. And there they are working away, sweeping their floors and putting up clean curtains and scrubbing their children's noses till they shine like rubies and making their homes like little Dutch pictures. You see, thirty pounds is a devil of a lot of money for poor people. As one mother of a large family said to me, 'With that one could bury them all quite beautiful.'”
“You're a wonderful fellow,” said I, somewhat enviously.
He gave an awkward laugh and tugged at his beard.
“I've only happened to find my job, and am doing it as well as I can,” he said. “'Tisn't very much, after all. Sometimes one gets discouraged; people are such ungrateful pigs, but now and again one does help a lame dog over a stile which bucks one up, you know. Why don't you come down and have a look at us one of these days? You've been promising to do so for years.”
“I will,” said I with sudden interest.
“You can have a peep at one or two of the competing homes. We pop into them unexpectedly at all hours. That's a part of the game. We've a complicated system of marks which I'll show you. Of course, no woman knows how she's getting on, otherwise many would lose heart.”
“How do the men like this disconcerting ubiquity of soap and water?”
“They love it!” he cried. “They're keen on the prize too. Some think they'll grab the lot and have the devil's own drunk when the year's up. But I'll look after that. Besides, when a chap has been living in the pride of cleanliness for a year he'll get into the way of it and be less likely to make a beast of himself. Anyway, I hope for the best. My God, de Gex, if I didn't hope and hope and hope,” he cried earnestly, “I don't know how I should get through anything without hope and a faith in the ultimate good of things.”
“The same inconvincible optimist?” said I.