The result was, as usual, farcically pathetic.

His nice white hair which had given him a charming benignity and cleanness had been turned into a dead and musty black which made him look unearthly and unreal.

His smart and carefully cherished moustache which once had laid upon his upper lip like cotton wool had been treated with the same ink-colored mixture.

His clothes, once so perfectly suitable, were now those built for a man of Harry Oldershaw's youthful lines and gave him the appearance of one who had forced himself into a suit made for his son.

It was of a very blue flannel with white lines,--always a trying combination.