“Now whether it was anything you had said coming back to me, I cannot tell, but next day, that was yesterday, all at once, in the shop here, as I was serving Mrs. Ramshorn, the thought came to me: How would Jesus Christ have done if he had been a draper instead of a carpenter? When she was gone, I went up to my room to think about it. And there it seemed--that first I must know how he did as a carpenter. But that we are told nothing about. I could get no light upon that. And so my thoughts turned again to the original question.--How would he have done had he been a draper? And, strange to say, I seemed to know far more about that than the other, and to have something to go upon. In fact I had a sharp and decisive answer concerning several things of which I had dared to make a question.”
“The vision of the ideal woke the ideal in yourself,” said Wingfold thoughtfully.
“I don’t know that I quite understand that,” returned Mr. Drew; “but the more I thought the more dissatisfied I became. And, in a word, it has come to this, that I must set things right, or give up business.”
“That would be no victory,” remarked the curate.
“I know it, and shall not yield without a struggle, I promise you. That same afternoon, taking the opportunity of having overheard one of them endeavouring to persuade an old farmer’s wife to her disadvantage, I called all my people, and told them that if ever I heard one of them do such a thing, I would turn him or her away at once. But when I came to look at it, I saw how difficult it would be to convict of the breach of such a vague law; and unfortunately too I had some time ago introduced the system of a small percentage to the sellers, making it their interest to force sales. That however is easily rectified, and I shall see to it at once. But I do wish I had a more definite law to follow than that of doing AS!”
“Would not more light inside do as well as clearer law outside?” suggested Wingfold.
“How can I tell till I have had a chance of trying?” returned the draper with a smile, which speedily vanished as he went on: “Then again, there’s about profits! How much ought I to take? Am I to do as others do, and always be ruled by the market? Am I bound to give my customers the advantage of any special bargain I may have made? And then again--for I do a large wholesale business with the little country shops--if I learn that one of my customers is going down hill, have I, or have I not, a right to pounce upon him, and make him pay me, to the detriment of his other creditors? There’s no end of questions, you see, sir.”