But he left the spring freshness behind him when he entered that sad, dingy, swarming region to the south, where the only clean creature seemed to be the occasional policeman in his new summer tunic, sauntering aloof amid the noise and wretchedness and the foul odours made fouler by the sunshine. Cleland presently found the squalid street which he wished to describe in convincing detail, and stood there on the corner in the shelter of a tobacconist’s awning making preliminary mental notes. Then, as he fished out note-book and pencil, intent on professional memoranda, he saw Grismer. The man wore shabbier clothes than Cleland had ever before seen him wear; he was crossing the filthy street at his usual graceful and leisurely saunter, and he did not see Cleland under the awning. There was a chop-suey restaurant opposite, a shabby, disreputable, odoriferous place, doubly repulsive in the pitiless sunshine. And into this sauntered Grismer and disappeared. The slight shock of the episode remained to bother Cleland all the morning. He kept thinking of it while trying to work; he could not seem to put it from his mind and finally threw aside his manuscript, took his hat and stick, and went out with the intention of lunching. It was nearly lunch time, but he did not walk toward the cream-coloured Hotel Rochambeau, with its green awnings and its French flag flying. He took the other way, scarcely realizing what he meant to do until he turned the corner into Bleecker Street. He found the basement he was in search of presently; two steps down, an area gate and bell encrusted with rust, and a diseased and homeless cat dozing there in patient misery. "You poor devil," he said, offering a cautious caress; but the gaunt creature struck at him and fled. He rang. Jangling echoes resounded from within. Two negro wenches and a Chinaman surveyed him from adjoining houses. He could smell a sour stench from the beer saloon opposite, where a fat German beast was washing down the sidewalk with a mop. "Hello, Cleland. This is very nice of you. Come in!" said a pleasant voice behind him, and, as he turned, Grismer, in shabby slippers and faded dressing-gown, opened the iron wicket. "I hadn’t called," said Cleland a little stiffly, "—so I thought I’d drop in for a moment and take you out somewhere to lunch." Grismer smiled his curious, non-committal smile and ushered him into a big, whitewashed basement, with a screen barring the further end and quite bare except for a few bits of furniture, some plaster casts, and half a dozen revolving tables on which stood unfinished studies in clay and wax. Cleland involuntarily glanced about him, then went over and politely examined the studies in clay. "I’ve a back yard, too," said Grismer, "where I work in good weather. The light in here isn’t particularly good."