As it promised to be a slack week, Paasch had decided to dress the window himself, as he felt that the goods were not displayed to their proper advantage. This was a perquisite of Jonah's, for which he was paid eighteenpence extra once a fortnight; but Jonah had deserted him—a fact which he discovered by finding that Jonah's tools, his only property, were missing.
So he had spent a busy morning in renovating his entire stock with double coats of Peerless Gloss, the stock that the whole neighbourhood knew by sight—the watertight bluchers with soles an inch thick that a woolwasher from Botany had ordered and left on his hands; the pair of kangaroo tops that Pat Riley had ordered the week he was pinched for manslaughter; the pair of flash kid lace-ups, high in the leg, that Katey Brown had thrown at his head because they wouldn't meet round her thick calves; and half a dozen pairs of misfits into which half the neighbourhood had tried to coax their feet because they were dirt cheap.
But the pride of the collection was a monstrous abortion of a boot, made for a clubfoot, with a sole and heel six inches deep, that had cost Paasch weeks of endless contrivance, and had only one fault—it was as heavy as lead and unwearable. But Paasch clung to it with the affection of a mother for her deformed offspring, and gave it the pride of place in the window. And daily the urchins flattened their noses against the panes, fascinated by this monster of a boot, to see it again in dreams on the feet of horrid giants. This melancholy collection was flanked by odd bottles of polish and blacking, and cards of bootlaces of such unusual strength that elephants were shown vainly trying to break them.
The old man paused in his labours to admire the effect of his new arrangement, and suddenly noticed a group of children gathered about a man painting a sign on the window opposite. Paasch stared; but the words were a blur to his short sight, and he went inside to look for his spectacles, which he had pushed up on his forehead in order to dress the window. By the time he had looked everywhere without finding them, the painter had finished the lettering, and was outlining the figure of something on the window with rapid strokes.
Paasch itched with impatience. He would have crossed the street to look, but he made it a rule never to leave the shop, even for a minute, lest someone should steal the contents in his absence. As he fidgeted with impatience, it occurred to him to ask a small boy, who was passing, what was being painted on the window.
"Why, a boot of course," replied the child.
Paasch's amazement was so great that, forgetting the caution of a lifetime, he walked across until the words came into range. What he saw brought him to a standstill in the middle of Botany Road, heedless of the traffic, for the blur of words had resolved themselves into:
And, underneath, the pattern of a shoe, which the painter was finishing with rapid strokes.
So, thought Paasch, another had come to share the trade and take the bread out of his mouth, and he choked with the egotistical dread of the shopkeeper at another rival in the struggle for existence. Who could this be? he thought, with the uneasy fear of a man threatened with danger. For the moment he had forgotten Jonah's real name, and he looked into the shop to size up his adversary with the angry curiosity of a soldier facing the enemy. Then, through the open door, he spied the familiar figure of the hunchback moving about the shop and placing things in order. He swallowed hastily, with the choking sensation of a parent whose child has at last revolted, for his rival was the misshapen boy that he had taken off the streets, and clothed and fed for years. Jonah came to the door for a moment, and, catching sight of the old man, stared at him fixedly without a sign of recognition.
And suddenly, with a contraction at his heart, a fear and dread of Jonah swept through Paasch, the vague, primeval distrust and suspicion of the deformed that lurks in the normal man, a survival of the ancient hostility that in olden times consigned them to the stake as servants of the Evil One.
He forgot where he was till the warning snort of a steam tram made him jump aside and miss the wheels of a bus from the opposite direction by the skin of his teeth.
And the whole street smiled at the sight of the bewildered old man, with his silvery hair and leather apron, standing in the middle of the Road to stare at a dingy shop opposite.
Paasch crossed the street and entered his door again with the air of a man who has been to a funeral. He had never made any friends, but, in his gruff, reserved way, he liked Jonah. He had taught him his trade, and here, with a sudden sinking in his heart, he remembered that the pupil had easily surpassed the master in dexterity. Then another fear assailed him. How would he get through his work? for most of it had passed through Jonah's nimble fingers. Ah well, it was no matter! He was a lonely old man with nothing but his fiddle to bring back the memories of the Fatherland.
The week ran to an end, and found Jonah out of pocket. He had planted himself like a footpad at the door of his old master to rob him of his trade and living; and day by day he counted the customers passing in and out of the old shop, but none came his way. As he stared across the street at his rival's shop, his face changed; it was like a hawk's, threatening and predatory, indifferent to the agony of the downy breast and fluttering wings that it is about to strike.
It maddened him to see the stream of people pass his shop with indifference, as if it were none of their business whether he lived or starved. The memory of his boyish days returned to him, when every man's hand was against him, and he took food and shelter with the craft of an old soldier in hostile country. Even the shop which he had furnished and laid out with such loving care, seemed a cunning trap to devour his precious sovereigns week by week.
True, he had drawn some custom, but it was of the worst sort—that of the unprincipled rogues who fatten upon tradesmen till the back of their credit is broken, and then transfer their sinister custom to another. Jonah recognized them with a grim smile, but he had taken their work, glad of something to do, although he would never see the colour of their money.
Meanwhile the weeks ran into a month, and Jonah had not paid expenses. He could hold out for three months according to his calculation, but he saw the end rapidly approaching, when he must retire covered with ignominious defeat. He would have thrown up the sponge there and then, but for the thought of the straight-limbed child in Cardigan Street, for whom he wanted money—money to feed and clothe him for the world to admire.
One Saturday night, weary of waiting for the custom that never came, he closed the shop, and joined Ada, who was waiting on the footpath. They sauntered along, Ada stopping every minute to look into the shop windows, while Jonah, gloomy and taciturn, turned his back on the lighted windows with impatience. Presently Ada gave a cry of delight before the draper's.
"I say, Joe, that bonnet would suit the kid all to pieces. An' look at the price! Only last week they was seven an' a kick."
Jonah turned and looked at the window. The bonnet, fluffy and absurd, was marked with a ticket bearing an enormous figure 4 in red ink, and beside it, faintly marked in pencil, the number 11.
"W'y don't yer say five bob, an' be done with it?" said Jonah.
"But it ain't five bob; it's only four an' eleven," insisted Ada, annoyed at his stupidity.
"An' I suppose it 'ud be dear at five bob?" sneered Jonah.
"Any fool could tell yer that," snapped Ada.
Jonah included the whole feminine world in a shrug of the shoulders, and turned impatiently on his heel. But Ada was not to be torn away. She ran her eye over the stock, marvelling at the cheapness of everything. Jonah, finding nothing better to do, lit a cigarette, and turned a contemptuous eye on the bales of calico, cheap prints, and flimsy lace displayed. Presently he began to study the tickets with extraordinary interest. They were all alike. The shillings in gigantic figures of red or black, and across the dividing line elevenpence three-farthings pencilled in strokes as modest as the shy violet. When Jonah reached Cardigan Street, he was preoccupied and silent, and sat on the veranda, smoking in the dark, long after Ada and her mother had gone to bed.
About one o'clock Mrs Yabsley, who was peacefully ironing shirts in her sleep, was awakened by a loud hammering on the door. She woke up, and instantly recognized what had happened. Ada had left the candle burning and had set the house on fire, as her mother had daily predicted for the last ten years. Then the hammering ceased.
"Are yez awake, Mum?" cried Jonah's voice.
"No," said Mrs Yabsley firmly. "'Ow did it 'appen?"
"'Appen wot?" cried Jonah roughly.
"'Ow did the 'ouse ketch fire?" said Mrs Yabsley, listening for the crackling.
"The 'ouse ain't a-fire, an' ye're talkin' in yer sleep."
"Wot!" cried Mrs Yabsley, furiously, "yer wake me up out o' me sleep to tell me the 'ouse ain't a-fire. I'll land yer on the 'ead wi' me slipper, if yer don't go to bed."
"I say, Mum," entreated Jonah, "will yer gimme five quid on Monday, an ask no questions?"
Mrs Yabsley's only answer was a snore.
But a week later the morning procession that trudged along Botany Road towards the city was astonished at the sight of a small shop, covered with huge calico signs displaying in staring red letters on a white ground the legend:
The huge red letters, thrown out like a defiance and a challenge, caused a sensation in the Road. The pedestrians stopped to read the signs, looked curiously at the shop, and went on their way. The passengers in the trams and buses craned their necks, anxious to read the gigantic advertisement before they were carried out of sight. A group of urchins, stationed at the door, distributed handbills to the curious, containing the same announcement in bold type.
Across the street hung Paasch's dingy sign from which the paint was peeling:
—the old prices sanctioned by usage, unchangeable and immovable as the laws of nature to Paasch and the trade on Botany Road.
The shop itself was transformed. On one side were half a dozen new chairs standing in a row on a strip of bright red carpet. Gay festoons of coloured tissue paper, the work of Mrs Yabsley's hands, stretched in ropes across the ceiling. The window had been cleared and at a bench facing the street Jonah and an assistant pegged and hammered as if for dear life. Another, who bore a curious likeness to Chook, with his back to the street and a last on his knees, hammered with enthusiasm. A tremendous heap of old boots, waiting to be repaired, was thrown carelessly in front of the workers, who seemed too busy to notice the sensation they were creating.
The excitement increased when a customer, Waxy Collins by name, entered the shop, and, taking off his boots, sat down while they were repaired, reading the morning paper as coolly as if he were taking his turn at the barber's. The thing spread like the news of a murder, and through the day a group of idlers gathered, watching with intense relish the rapid movements of the workmen. Jonah had declared war.
Six weeks after he had opened the shop, Jonah found twelve of Mrs Yabsley's sovereigns between him and ignominious defeat. Then the tickets in the draper's window had given him an idea, and, like a general who throws his last battalion at the enemy, he had resolved to stake the remaining coins on the hazard. The calico signs, then a novelty, the fittings of the shop, and the wages for a skilful assistant, had swallowed six of his precious twelve pounds. With the remaining six he hoped to hold out for a fortnight. Then, unless the tide turned, he would throw up the sponge. Chook, amazed and delighted with the idea, had volunteered to disguise himself as a snob, and help to give the shop a busy look; and Waxy Collins jumped at the chance of getting his boots mended for the bare trouble of walking in and pretending to read the newspaper.
The other shopkeepers were staggered. They stared in helpless anger at the small shop, which had suddenly become the most important in their ken. Already they saw their families brought to the gutter by this hunchback ruffian, who hit them below the belt in the most ungentlemanly fashion in preference to starving. But the simple manoeuvre of cutting down the prices of his rivals was only a taste of the unerring instinct for business that was later to make him as much feared as respected in the trade. By a single stroke he had shown his ability to play on the weakness as well as the needs of the public, coupled with a pitiless disregard for other interests than his own, which constitutes business talent.
The public looked on, surprised and curious, drawn by the novelty of the idea and the amazing prices, but hesitating like an animal that fears a tempting bait. The ceaseless activity of the shop reassured them. One by one the customers arrived. Numbers bred numbers, and in a week a rush had set in. It became the fashion on the Road to loll in the shop, carelessly reading the papers for all the world to see, while your boots were being mended. On Saturday for the first time Jonah turned a profit, and the battle was won.
Among the later arrivals Jonah noticed with satisfaction some of Paasch's best customers, and every week, with an apologetic smile, another handed in his boots for repair. Soon there was little for Paasch to do but stand at his door, staring with frightened, short-sighted eyes across the Road at the octopus that was slowly squeezing the life out of his shop. But he obstinately refused to lower his prices, though his customers carried the work from his counter across the street. It seemed to him that the prices were something fixed by natural laws, like the return of the seasons or the multiplication table.
"I haf always charge tree an' six for men's, an' it cannot be done cheaper without taking de bread out of mine mouth," he repeated obstinately.
In three months Jonah hired another workman, and the landlord came down to see if the shop could be enlarged to meet Jonah's requirements. Then a traveller called with an armful of samples. He was travelling for his brother, he explained, who had a small factory. Jonah looked longingly, and confessed that he wanted to stock his shop, but had no money to buy. Then the traveller smiled, and explained to Jonah, alert and attentive, the credit system by which his firm would deliver fifty pounds' worth of boots at three months. Jonah was quick to learn, but cautious.
"D'ye mean yer'd gimme the boots, an' not want the money for three months?"
The traveller explained that was the usual practice.
"An' can I sell 'em at any price I like?"
The man said he could give them away if he chose. Jonah spent a pound on brass rods and glass stands, and sold the lot in a month at sixpence a pair profit. His next order ran into a hundred pounds, and Jonah had established a cash retail trade. Meanwhile, he worked in a way to stagger the busy bee. Morning and night the sound of his hammer never ceased, except the three nights a week he spent at a night school, where he discovered a remarkable talent for mental arithmetic and figures. Jonah the hunchback had found his vocation.
And in the still night, when he stopped to light a cigarette, Jonah could hear the mournful wail of a violin in Paasch's bedroom across the street. In his distress the old man had turned to his beloved instrument as one turns to an old friend. But now the tunes were never merry, only scraps and fragments of songs of love and despair, the melancholy folk-songs of his native land, long since forgotten, and now returning to his memory as its hold on the present grew feebler.
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