nd to their ears.

"Oh, I would like to hear some music!" cried Clara. "Something slow
and solemn, a dirge for the dying day."

Jonah turned and looked at her curiously, surprised by the gush of
emotion in her voice. He started to speak, and hesitated. Then the
words came with a rush.

"I could give yer a tune meself, but I suppose yer'd poke borak."

"Give me a tune? I never knew you could sing," said Clara, in surprise.

"Sing!" said Jonah, in scorn. "I can beat any singin' w'en I'm in good
nick."

"Whatever do you mean?" said Clara. She was surprised to see that the
habitual shrewd look had gone out of his eyes. He looked half ashamed
and defiant.

"Yer remember w'en I first met yer in the shop I mentioned that I could
do a bit with the mouth-organ?"

"The mouth-organ?" said Clara, smiling. "I thought only boys amused
themselves with that."

"No fear!" cried Jonah. "I 'eard a bloke at the 'Tiv.' play a fair
treat. That's 'ow I come to git this instrument," and he tapped
something in his breast pocket. "Kramer's 'ad to send 'ome for it, an'
I only got it this afternoon. I've bin dyin' to 'ave a go at it, but I
always wait till I git the place to meself. It wouldn't do for the
'ands to see the boss playin' the mouth-organ."

He took the instrument out of his pocket, and handed it to Clara with
the pride of a fiddler showing his Strad. Clara looked carelessly at
the flat row of tubes cased in nickel-silver.

"Exhibition concert organ with forty reeds," said Jonah. Again Clara
looked at the instrument with a slightly disdainful air, as an organist
would look at a penny whistle.

"Well, play something," she said with a smile.

Jonah breathed slowly into the reeds, up and down the scale, testing
the compass of the instrument. It was full and rich, unlike any that
she had heard in the streets. Presently he struck into a popular
ballad from the music-hall, holding the organ to his mouth with the
left hand. With his right he covered the pipes to control the volume
of sound as a pianist uses the pedals. When he had finished, Clara
smiled in encouragement, with a secret feeling that he was making
himself ridiculous. She looked across the water, wishing he would put
the thing away and stop this absurd exhibition. But Jonah had warmed
up to his work. He was back in Cardigan Street again, when the Push
marched through the streets with him in the lead, playing tunes that he
had learned at the m