"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 music-halls. In five minutes Clara's uneasiness had vanished, and she was listening to the music with a dreamy languor quite foreign to her usual composure. Her mind was filled with the fantastic splendour of the sunset; the fresh salt air had acted like a drug; and the sounds breathed into the reeds made her nerves vibrate like strings. Strange, lawless thoughts floated in her mind. The world was meant for love, and passionate sadness, and breaking hearts that healed at the glance of an eye. And as her ear followed the tune, her eyes were drawn with an irresistible movement to the musician. She found him staring at her with a magnetic look in his eyes.