The machine was one of those electric contrivances that do their work noiselessly and efficiently, like a garrotter or the guillotine. No odour, no teeth-disturbing grind of rack-and-pinion, no trumpeting, with that machine! It arrived before the gate with such absence of sound that Alice, though she was dusting in the front-room, did not hear it. She heard nothing till the bell discreetly tinkled. Justifiably assuming that the tinkler was the butcher's boy, she went to the door with her apron on, and even with the duster in her hand. A handsome, smooth man stood on the step, and the electric carriage made a background for him. He was a dark man, with curly black hair, and a moustache to match, and black eyes. His silk hat, of an incredible smooth newness, glittered over his glittering hair and eyes. His overcoat was lined with astrakan, and this important fact was casually betrayed at the lapels and at the sleeves. He wore a black silk necktie, with a small pearl pin in the mathematical centre of the perfect rhomboid of the upper part of a sailor's knot. His gloves were of slate colour. The chief characteristic of his faintly striped trousers was the crease, which seemed more than mortal. His boots were of glacÉ kid and as smooth as his cheeks. The cheeks had a fresh boyish colour, and between them, over admirable snowy teeth, projected the hooked key to this temperament. It is possible that Alice, from sheer thoughtlessness, shared the vulgar prejudice against Jews; but certainly she did not now feel it. The man's personal charm, his exceeding niceness, had always conquered that prejudice, whenever encountered. Moreover, he was only about thirty-five in years, and no such costly and beautiful male had ever yet stood on Alice's doorstep.

She at once, in her mind, contrasted him with the curates of the previous week, to the disadvantage of the Established Church. She did not know that this man was more dangerous than a thousand curates.

"Is this Mr. Leek's?" he inquired smilingly, and raised his hat.

"Yes," said Alice with a responsive smile.

"Is he in?"

"Well," said Alice, "he's busy at his work. You see in this weather he can't go out much--not to work--and so he--"

"Could I see him in his studio?" asked the glossy man, with the air of saying, "Can you grant me this supreme favour?"

It was the first time that Alice had heard the attic called a studio. She paused.

"It's about pictures," explained the visitor.

"Oh!" said Alice. "Will you come in?"

"I've run down specially to see Mr. Leek," said the visitor with emphasis.

Alice's opinion as to the seriousness of her husband's gift for painting had of course changed in two years. A man who can make two or three hundred a year by sticking colours anyhow, at any hazard, on canvases--by producing alleged pictures that in Alice's secret view bore only a comic resemblance to anything at all--that man had to be taken seriously in his attic as an artisan. It is true that Alice thought the payment he received miraculously high for the quality of work done; but, with this agreeable Jew in the hall, and the coupÉ at the kerb, she suddenly perceived the probability of even greater miracles in the matter of price. She saw the average price of ten pounds rising to fifteen, or even twenty, pounds--provided her husband was given no opportunity to ruin the affair by his absurd, retiring shyness.

"Will you come this way?" she suggested briskly.

And all that elegance followed her up to the attic door: which door she threw open, remarking simply--

"Henry, here is a gentleman come to see you about pictures."