Vandover took off his coat, his old and greasy cutaway, and began work.  He drew a pail of water from the garden faucet in a neighbour’s yard, and commenced washing the windows.  First he washed the panes from the inside, very careful not to disturb Adams & Brunt’s signs, and then cleaned the outside, sitting upon the window ledge, his body half in and half out of the house.

Geary enjoyed himself immensely.  The news of the landlord’s visit had spread from cottage to cottage, awakening a mild excitement throughout the length of the row.  The women showed themselves on the steps or on the sidewalks, very slatternly, without corsets, their hair coming down, dressed in faded calico wrappers just as they had come from the laundry tubs or the cook-stove.  They bethought them of their various grievances, a leak here, a broken door-bell there, a certain bad smell that was supposed to have some connection with a rash upon the children’s faces.  They waited for Geary’s appearance by ones and twos, timid, very respectful, but querulous for all that, filling the air with their lamentations.

Vandover had finished with the windows.  Now he was cleaning out the sink and the laundry tubs.  They smelt very badly and were all foul with a greasy mixture of old lard, soap, soot, and dust; a little mould was even beginning to form about the faucets of the tubs.  The escape pipe of the sink was clogged, and he had to run his finger into it again and again to get it free.  The kitchen was very dirty; old bottles of sweet oil, mouldy vinegar and flat beer cluttered the dusty shelves of the pantry.

Meanwhile Geary continued his rounds.  He went about among the groups of his tenants, very pleased and contented, smiling affably upon them.  He enlarged himself, giving himself the airs of an English lord in the midst of his tenantry, listening to their complaints with a good-humoured smile of toleration.  A few men were about, some of whom were out of work for the moment; others who were sick.  To these Geary was particularly condescending.  He sat in their parlours, little, crowded rooms, smelling of stale upholstery and of the last meal, where knitted worsted tidies, very gaudy, covered the backs of the larger chairs and where one inevitably discovered the whatnot standing in one corner, its shelves filled with shell-boxes, broken thermometers and little alabaster jars, shaped like funeral urns, where one kept the matches.  The wife brought the children in, very dirty, looking solemnly at Geary, their eyes enlarged in the direct unwinking gaze of cows.

By this time Vandover had finished with the sinks and tubs and was down upon his hands and knees scrubbing the stains of grease upon the floor of the kitchen.  It was very hard work, as his water was cold.  He was still working about this spot when Geary returned.  By this time Vandover was so tired that he trembled all over, his spine seemed to be breaking in two, and every now and then he paused and passed his hand over the small of his back, closing his eyes and drawing a long breath.