living-rooms fitted up over
the shop, for the part which was required as a store-room left ample
space for a family of three. Ada gave in with a sullen anger, refusing
to notice the splendours of the new establishment. But she had a real
terror, besides her objection to being for ever under Jonah's sharp
eyes.

Born and bred in a cottage, she had a natural horror of staircases,
looking on them as dangerous contrivances on which people daily risked
their lives. She climbed them slowly, feeling for safety with her
feet, and descended with her heart in her mouth. The sight of others
tripping lightly up and down impressed her like a dangerous performance
on the tight-rope in a circus. And the new rooms could only be reached
by two staircases, one at the far end of the shop, winding like a
corkscrew to the upper floor, and another, sickening to the eye,
dropping from the rear balcony in the open air to the kitchen and the
yard.

Mrs Yabsley continued to live in the old cottage in Cardigan Street.
Jonah made her an allowance, but she still worked at the laundry, not
for a living, as she carefully explained to every new customer, but for
the sake of exercise. And she had obstinately refused to be pensioned
off.

"I've seen too many of them pensioners, creepin' an' coughin' along the
street, because they thought they was too old fer work, an' one fine
mornin' they fergit ter come down ter breakfust, an' the neighbours are
invited to the funeral. An' but for that they might 'ave lived fer
years, drawin' their money an' standin' in the way of younger men. No
pensions fer me, thank yer!"

When Jonah had pointed out that she could not live alone in the
cottage, she had listened with a mysterious smile. With Jonah's
allowance and her earnings, she was the rich woman, the lady chatelaine
of the street, and she chose a companion from the swarm of houseless
women that found a precarious footing in the houses of their
relations--women with raucous voices, whose husbands had grown tired of
life and fled; ladies who were vaguely supposed to be widows; comely
young women cast on a cold world with a pitiful tale and a handbag.
And she fed them till they were plump and vicious again, when they
invariably disappeared, taking everything of value they could lay hands
on. When Jonah, exasperated by these petty thefts, begged her to come
and live with them, she shook her head, with a humorous twinkle in her
eyes.

"No, yer'd '