<h2><SPAN name="page98"></SPAN><span class="pagenum"></span>XI.</h2>
<p><span class="smcap">The</span> red paint-pot, and a blue one
from the same quarter, together with a yellow one from the
neighbours on the other side, a white one from an old lighterman
in the house behind, and a suitable collection of brushes
subscribed by all three, were Johnny’s constant companions
till the end of that weary week. The shop-shutters grew to
be red, with a blue border. The window-frames were yellow,
the wall beneath was white, so was the cornice above; and the
door and the door-posts were red altogether, because the red
paint went farthest, and the red pot had been fullest to begin
with. Not only did the length of the job work off
Johnny’s first enthusiasm, but its publicity embarrassed
him. Perched conspicuously on a step-ladder, painting a
shop in such stirring colours as these, he was the cynosure of
all wayfaring folk, the target of whatever jibes their wits might
compass. Three out of four warned him that the paint was
laid on wrong side out. Some, in unkindly allusion to
certain chance splashes, reminded him that he hadn’t half
painted the window-panes; and facetious boys, in piteous
pantomime, affected to be reduced to instant <SPAN name="page99"></SPAN><span class="pagenum"></span>blindness by
sudden knowledge of Johnny’s brilliant performance.
But he was most discomforted by those who merely stood and
stared, invisible behind him. If only he could have seen
them it would not have been so bad; the oppressive consciousness
that some contemptuous grown man behind and below—possibly
a painter by trade—was narrowly observing every stroke of
the brush, shook his nerve and enfeebled his execution.
Most of these earnest spectators seemed to have no pressing
business of their own, and their inspections were
prolonged. One critic found speech to remark, as he turned
to go his way: “Well, you <i>are</i> makin’ a
bloomin’ mess up there!” But most, as if at a
loss for words by mere amazement, sheered off with: “Well,
blimy!” It was discouraging to find that all these
people could have done it so much better, and, long before the
job was finished, Johnny was sore depressed and very humble, as
well as tired. Only one of all his witnesses offered help,
and he was a surprising person: very tall, very thin, and very
sooty from work; with splay feet, sloping shoulders, a long face
of exceeding diffidence, and long arms, which seemed to swing and
flap irresponsibly with the skirts of his long overcoat, and to
be a subject of mute apology. He saw Johnny tip-toeing at
the very top of the steps, making a bad shift to reach the
cornice. He stopped, looked about him, and then went on a
step or two; stopped again, and came back, with a timorous <SPAN name="page100"></SPAN><span class="pagenum"></span>glance at
the shop window; and when Johnny turned and looked, he said, in a
voice scarce above a whisper: “Can’tcher reach
it?”</p>
<p>“Not very well.”</p>
<p>“Let’s come.” And when Johnny
descended, the long man, with one more glance about the street,
went up three steps at a time and laid the paint on rapidly, many
feet at a sweep. He came down and shifted the steps very
easily with one hand—and they were heavy steps—went
up again, and in three minutes carried the paint to the very end
of the cornice. Then he came down, with a sheepish smile at
Johnny’s thanks, and shambled as far as next door, where he
let himself in with a latch-key. And on Friday, at
dinner-time, perceiving Johnny’s progress from his window
on the upper floor—he was a lodger, it seemed—he came
stealthily down and gave the cornice another coat.</p>
<div class="gapspace"> </div>
<p>On Saturday morning the shop was opened in form, though
Johnny’s painting was not finished till dusk. Very
little happened. A few children stopped on their way, and
stared in at the door. The first customer was a boy from
among these, who came in to beg a piece of string; and infested
Harbour Lane for the rest of the day, swinging a dead rat on the
end of it. Hours passed, and Nan May’s spirits fell
steadily. A few pounds, a very few—they could scarce
be made to last <SPAN name="page101"></SPAN><span class="pagenum">p.
101</span>three weeks—was all her reserve, and most of her
scanty stock was perishable. If it spoiled it could never
be replaced, and unless people bought it, spoil it must.
What more could she do? Industry, determination, and all
the rest were well enough, but when all was said and done,
nothing could make people come and buy.</p>
<p>Near noon the second customer came—a little girl this
time. She wanted a bottle of ink for a halfpenny.
There were half-a dozen little bottles of ink in a row in the
window; but the price was a penny, so the little girl went
away. It was a dull dinner that day. Bessy invented
ingenious conjectures to account for the lack of trade, and
prophesied a change in the afternoon, or the evening, or perhaps
next week, or at latest the week after. Her mother could
not understand. Customers came to other shops; why not to
this one?</p>
<p>She had seen nothing of Uncle Isaac since she had come to
Harbour Lane, though he knew where to find her. She had
hoped he would lend a hand with the painting, or with the display
of the stock; but no doubt he had been too busy. True,
Johnny thought he had seen him once from the steps, some way down
the street, but that must have been a mistake; for Uncle Isaac
would not have come so near them without calling, nor would he
have bolted instantly round the nearest <SPAN name="page102"></SPAN><span class="pagenum"></span>corner at
sight of the boy and his work, as Johnny had fancied he had.</p>
<p>The afternoon began no better than the morning. Nobody
came but a child, who asked for sixpenn’orth of coppers,
till about four. Then a hurried woman demanded a
penn’orth of mixed pickles in a saucer, and grumbled at the
quantity. She wouldn’t come into the shop again, at
anyrate; a threat so discomposing (for was not the woman the
first paying customer?) that for hours Nan May could not forgive
herself for her illiberality; though indeed she gained but a weak
fraction of a farthing by the transaction.</p>
<p>Half an hour more went, and then there came a truly noble
customer. He looked like a bricklayer, and he was far from
sober: so far, indeed, that Johnny, on the steps, spying the mazy
sinuosity of his approach, got a step lower and made ready to
jump, in case of accidents. But the bricklayer, conscious
of the presence of many ladders, steered wide into the roadway,
and there stopped, fascinated by the brilliancy before him.
Some swaying moments of consideration resolved him that this was
a shop: and after many steps up the curb, and as many back in the
gutter, he picked a labyrinthine path among the myriad ladders,
narrowly missing the real one as he went, shouldered against the
wet door-post, and stumbled toward the counter. Here he
regarded a <SPAN name="page103"></SPAN><span class="pagenum">p.
103</span>bladder of lard with thoughtful severity, till Nan May
timorously asked what he wanted.</p>
<p>“Shumm for kidsh,” he replied sternly, to the
lard. “Shummforkidsh.” For some moments
his scowl deepened; then he raised his hand and pointed.
“W—wha’sha’?” he demanded.</p>
<p>“Lard.”</p>
<p>“Tharr’ll do.” He plunged his hand
into his trousers pocket. “Tharr’ll do.
’Ow mush?”</p>
<p>“Sevenpence halfpenny a pound.”</p>
<p>“Orrigh’? Gi’s
’oldovit.” He reached an unsteady hand,
imperilling bottles; but Nan May was quicker, and took the
bladder of lard from its perch.</p>
<p>“How much?” she asked.</p>
<p>“’Ow much? Thash wha’ <i>I</i>
wan’ know. You give it ’ere, go
on.” His voice rose disputatively, and he fell on the
bladder of lard with both hands. “’Ow
mush?”</p>
<p>Nan reflected that it weighed more than three pounds, and that
she had paid Mr. Dunkin eighteenpence for it. “Two
shillings,” she said.</p>
<p>“Two shillin’. Orrigh’,” and
instantly what remained of the new customer’s week’s
wages was scattered about the counter. Mrs. May took two
shillings and returned the rest; which with some difficulty was
thrust back into the pocket. And the new customer, after
looking narrowly about him in search of his purchase, and at last
<SPAN name="page104"></SPAN><span class="pagenum">p.
104</span>discovering it under his arm, sallied forth with a wipe
against the other door-post, and continued his winding way: a
solemn and portentous bricklayer, with red paint on his shoulders
and whiskers, and a bladder of lard that slipped sometimes
forward and sometimes backward from his embrace, and was a deal
of trouble to pick up again.</p>
<p>Here was a profit of sixpence at a stroke, unlikely as the
chance was to recur; and it raised Nan’s spirits,
unreasonably enough. Still, the bricklayer brought luck of
a sort. For there were three more customers within the next
hour, two bringing a halfpenny and one a penny. And in the
evening five or six came, one spending as much as
fourpence. This was better, perhaps, but poor enough.
At ten that night Nan May reckoned her profit for the day at
ninepence farthing, including the bricklayer’s sixpence;
and she was sick with waiting and faint with fear. At
half-past ten Uncle Isaac turned up.</p>
<p>“Ah hum,” he said; “bin
paintin’. Might ’a’ laid it on a bit
evener. There’s right ways o’ layin’ on
paint, an’ there’s wrong ways, an’ one way
ain’t the same as the other.” He raised his
finger at Johnny instructively. “Far from it and
contrairy, there’s a great difference.” Uncle
Isaac paused, and no further amplification of his proposition
occurring to him, he turned to Mrs. May.
“’Ow’s trade?” he asked.</p>
<p><SPAN name="page105"></SPAN><span class="pagenum"></span>Nan
May shook her head sadly. “Very bad, uncle,”
she said. “Hardly any at all.” And she
felt nearer crying than ever since the funeral.</p>
<p>“Ah,” said Uncle Isaac, sitting on a packing
case—empty, but intended to look full; “ah, what you
want’s Enterprise. Enterprise; that’s what you
want. What is it as stimilates trade an’ encourages
prosperity to—to the latest improvements?
Enterprise. Why is commercial opulentness took—at
least, wafted—commercial opulentness wafted round the
’ole world consekince o’ what? Consekince
o’ Enterprise.” Uncle Isaac tapped the counter
with his forefinger and gazed solemnly in Nan May’s
troubled face. “Consekince o’
Enterprise,” he repeated slowly, with another tap.
Then he added briskly, with a glance at the inner door:
“’Adjer supper?”</p>
<p>“No, uncle,” Nan answered. “I never
thought of it. But, now you’re here, p’raps
you’ll have a bit with us?”</p>
<p>“Ah—don’t mind if I do,” Uncle Isaac
responded cheerfully. “That looks a nice little bit
o’ bacon. Now a rasher auf that, an’ a
hegg—got a hegg? O yus.” He saw a dozen
in a basin. “A rasher auf that, an’ a hegg or
two, ’ud be just the thing, with a drop o’ beer,
wouldn’t it?”</p>
<p>Johnny fetched the beer, and Uncle Isaac had two rashers and
four eggs; and he finished with a good solid <SPAN name="page106"></SPAN><span class="pagenum"></span>piece of
bread, and the first slice—a large one—out of the
Dutch cheese from the counter. Nan May made no more than a
pretence at eating a little bread and cheese.</p>
<p>When at last the jug was empty, and Uncle Isaac was full, he
leaned back in his chair, and for some minutes exercised his lips
in strange workings and twistings, with many incidental clicks
and sucks and fizzes, while he benignantly contemplated the angle
of the ceiling. When at last the display flagged, he
brought his gaze gradually lower, till it rested on the
diminished piece of bacon. “None so bad, that
bacon,” he observed, putting his head aside with a critical
regard. “Though p’raps rayther more of a
breakfast specie than a supper.” He laid his head to
the other side, as one anxious to be impartial.
“Yus,” he went on thoughtfully, “more of a
breakfast specie, as you might say.” Then after a
pause, he added, with the air of one announcing a brilliant
notion:—“I b’lieve—yus, I do
b’lieve I’ll try a bit for breakfast to-morrer
mornin’!”</p>
<p>“If you like, uncle,” Nan answered, a little
faintly. “But—but-”
timidly—“I was thinking p’raps it’ll make
it look rather small to—to put on the counter.”</p>
<p>“So it would—so it would,” Uncle Isaac
admitted frankly; and indeed the remaining piece was scarce of
four rashers’ capacity. “Pity to cut it, as you
say, Nan. Thanks—I’ll just wrop it up as it
is. It’ll come in for <SPAN name="page107"></SPAN><span class="pagenum"></span>Monday too; an’ that large bit
o’ streaky’ll look a deal more nobler on the
counter.”</p>
<p>Uncle Isaac’s visit swept away the day’s profits
and a trifle more. But certainly, Uncle Isaac must not be
offended now that things looked so gloomy ahead.</p>
<p>Bessy lay, and strained her wits far into the night, inventing
comfortable theories and assurances, and exchanging them with her
mother for others as hopeful. But in the morning each
pillow had its wet spot.</p>
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