第28章

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.

THE COURTING OF PINKEY

It was Monday morning,and,according to their habit,the Partridges were moving.Every stick of their furniture was piled on the van,and Pinkey,who was carrying the kerosene lamp for fear of breakage,watched the load anxiously as the cart lurched over a rut.A cracked mirror,swinging loosely in its frame,followed every movement of the cart,one minute reflecting Pinkey's red hair and dingy skirt,the next swinging vacantly to the sky.

The cart stopped outside a small weatherboard cottage,and the vanman backed the wheels against the kerbstone,cracking his whip and swearing at the horse,which remained calm and obstinate,refusing to move except of its own accord.The noise brought the neighbours to their doors.

And they stood with prying eyes,ready to judge the social standing of the newcomers from their furniture.

It was the old battered furniture of a poor family,dragged from the friendly shelter of dark corners into the naked light of day,the back,white and rough as a packing-case,betraying the front,varnished and stained to imitate walnut and cedar.Every scratch and stain showed plainly on the tables and chairs fastened to their companions in misery,odd,nameless contrivances made of boxes and cretonne,that took the place of the sofas,wardrobes,and toilet-tables of the rich.Every mark and every dint was noted with satisfaction by the furtive eyes.The new arrivals had nothing to boast about.

Mrs Partridge,who collected gossip and scandal as some people collect stamps,generally tired of a neighbourhood in three months,after she had learned the principal facts--how much of the Brown's money went in drink,how much the Joneses owed at the corner shop,and who was really the father of the child that the Smiths treated as a poor relation.When she had sucked the neighbourhood dry like an orange,she took a house in another street,and Pinkey lost a day at the factory to move the furniture.