Darius Clayhanger's printing office was a fine example of the policy of
makeshift which governed and still governs the commercial activity of
the Five Towns. It consisted of the first floor of a nondescript
building which stood at the bottom of the irregularly shaped yard behind
the house and shop, and which formed the southern boundary of the
Clayhanger premises. The antique building had once been part of an
old-fashioned pot-works, but that must have been in the eighteenth
century. Kilns and chimneys of all ages, sizes, and tints rose behind
it to prove that this part of the town was one of the old manufacturing
quarters. The ground-floor of the building, entirely inaccessible from
Clayhanger's yard, had a separate entrance of its own in an alley that
branched off from Woodisun Bank, ran parallel to Wedgwood Street, and
stopped abruptly at the back gate of a saddler's workshop. In the
narrow entry you were like a creeping animal amid the undergrowth of a
forest of chimneys, ovens, and high blank walls. This ground-floor had
been a stable for many years; it was now, however, a baker's storeroom.
Once there had been an interior staircase leading from the ground-floor
to the first-floor, but it had been suppressed in order to save floor
space, and an exterior staircase constructed with its foot in
Clayhanger's yard. To meet the requirement of the staircase, one of the
first-floor windows had been transformed into a door. Further, as the
staircase came against one of the ground-floor windows, and as
Clayhanger's predecessor had objected to those alien windows overlooking
his yard, and as numerous windows were anyhow unnecessary to a stable,
all the ground-floor windows had been closed up with oddments of brick
and tile, giving to the wall a very variegated and chequered appearance.
Thus the ground-floor and the first-floor were absolutely divorced, the
former having its entrance and light from the public alley, the latter
from the private yard.
The first-floor had been a printing office for over seventy years. All
the machinery in it had had to be manoeuvred up the rickety stairs, or
put through one of the windows on either side of the window that had
been turned into a door. When Darius Clayhanger, in his audacity,
decided to print by steam, many people imagined that he would at last be
compelled to rent the ground-floor or to take other premises. But no!
The elasticity of the makeshift policy was not yet fully stretched.
Darius, in consultation with a jobbing builder, came happily to the
conclusion that he could `manage,' that he could `make things do,' by
adding to the top of his stairs a little landing for an engine-shed.
This was done, and the engine and boiler perched in the air; the shaft
of the engine went through the wall; the chimney-pipe of the boiler ran
up straight to the level of the roof-ridge, and was stayed with pieces
of wire. A new chimney had also been pierced in the middle of the roof,
for the uses of a heating stove. The original chimneys had been allowed
to fall into decay. Finally, a new large skylight added interest to the
roof. In a general way, the building resembled a suit of clothes that
had been worn, during four of the seven ages of man, by an untidy
husband with a tidy and economical wife, and then given by the wife to a
poor relation of a somewhat different figure to finish. All that could
be said of it was that it survived and served.
But these considerations occurred to nobody.
------------------------------------------------------------------------