Maria became so tearful that she was unable to continue her dinner.
The next morning, about a quarter to ten, Josiah boarded a Municipal tram at the foot of The Rise, earning in the process the almost groveling respect of its conductor, and paid twopence for a journey to Love Lane. Five doors up on the left was a meager house that had been converted into a greengrocer's shop. By far the most imposing thing about it was a signboard, which, although sadly in need of a coat of paint, boldly displayed the name William Hollis Fruiterer, in white letters on a black ground. For the last sixteen years, whenever the proprietor of the Duke of Wellington had occasion to pass this eyesore which was clearly visible from the busy main thoroughfare that ran by the end of the street, he made it a fixed rule to look the other way. But this morning when he got off the tram car at the corner, he set his teeth, faced the signboard resolutely and walked slowly towards it.
A stately thirty seconds or so of progress brought him to the shop itself. For a moment he stood looking in the window, which was neither more nor less than that of a visibly unprosperous greengrocer in a very small way of business. He then entered a rather moribund interior, the stock in trade of which consisted in the main of baskets of potatoes and carrots and an array of stale cabbages laid in a row on the counter.
The shop had no one in it, but the first step taken by an infrequent customer across its threshold rang a bell attached to the underside of a loose board in the floor, thereby informing a mysterious entity beyond a glass door draped with a surprisingly clean lace curtain that it was required elsewhere.
The entity did not immediately respond to Josiah's heavy-footed summons. When it did respond it was seen to be that of a thin faced, exceedingly unhappy looking woman of thirty-five whose hair was beginning to turn gray. Her print dress, much worn but scrupulously clean and neat, had its sleeves rolled back beyond the elbows; and this fact and a coarse sackcloth apron implied that she had been interrupted in the task of scrubbing the floor of the back premises.
The interior of the shop was rather dark and Josiah, having taken up a position in its most sunless corner, was not recognized at once by his eldest daughter.