Morrison appeared.
"Take this window over," said Mr. Garvace pointing his bunch of
fingers at Parsons. "Take all this muddle out and dress it properly."
Morrison advanced and hesitated.
"I beg your pardon, Sir," said Parsons with an immense politeness,
"but this is _my_ window."
"Take it all out," said Mr. Garvace, turning away.
Morrison advanced. Parsons shut the door with a click that arrested
Mr. Garvace.
"Come out of that window," he said. "You can't dress it. If you want
to play the fool with a window----"
"This window's All Right," said the genius in window dressing, and
there was a little pause.
"Open the door and go right in," said Mr. Garvace to Morrison.
"You leave that door alone, Morrison," said Parsons.
Polly was no longer even trying to hide behind the stack of Bolton
sheetings. He realised he was in the presence of forces too stupendous
to heed him.
"Get him out," said Mr. Garvace.
Morrison seemed to be thinking out the ethics of his position. The
idea of loyalty to his employer prevailed with him. He laid his hand
on the door to open it; Parsons tried to disengage his hand. Mr.
Garvace joined his effort to Morrison's. Then the heart of Polly leapt
and the world blazed up to wonder and splendour. Parsons disappeared
behind the partition for a moment and reappeared instantly, gripping a
thin cylinder of rolled huckaback. With this he smote at Morrison's
head. Morrison's head ducked under the resounding impact, but he clung
on and so did Mr. Garvace. The door came open, and then Mr. Garvace
was staggering back, hand to head; his autocratic, his sacred
baldness, smitten. Parsons was beyond all control--a strangeness, a
marvel. Heaven knows how the artistic struggle had strained that
richly endowed temperament. "Say I can't dress a window, you
thundering old Humbug," he said, and hurled the huckaback at his
master. He followed this up by hurling first a blanket, then an armful
of silesia, then a window support out of the window into the shop. It
leapt into Polly's mind that Parsons hated his own effort and was glad
to demolish it. For a crowded second Polly's mind was concentrated
upon Parsons, infuriated, active, like a figure of earthquake with
its coat off, shying things headlong.
Then he perceived the back of Mr. Garvace and heard his gubernatorial
voice crying to no one in particular and everybody in general: "Get
him out of the window. He's mad. He's dangerous. Get him out of the
window."
Then a crimson blanket was for a moment over the head of Mr. Garvace,
and his voice, muffled for an instant, broke out into unwonted
expletive.
Then people had arrived from all parts of the Bazaar. Luck, the ledger
clerk, blundered against Polly and said, "Help him!" Somerville from
the silks vaulted the counter, and seized a chair by the back. Polly
lost his head. He clawed at the Bolton sheeting before him, and if he
could have detached a piece he would certainly have hit somebody with
it. As it was he simply upset the pile. It fell away from Polly, and
he had an impression of somebody squeaking as it went down. It was the
sort of impression one disregards. The collapse of the pile of goods
just sufficed to end his subconscious efforts to get something to hit
somebody with, and his whole attention focussed itself upon the
struggle in the window. For a splendid instant Parsons towered up over
the active backs that clustered about the shop window door, an active
whirl of gesture, tearing things down and throwing them, and then he
went under. There was an instant's furious struggle, a crash, a second
crash and the crack of broken plate glass. Then a stillness and heavy
breathing.
Parsons was overpowered....
Polly, stepping over scattered pieces of Bolton sheeting, saw his
transfigured friend with a dark cut, that was not at present bleeding,
on the forehead, one arm held by Somerville and the other by Morrison.
"You--you--you--you annoyed me," said Parsons, sobbing for breath.