The shop wanted livening up with a coat of paint.

He would put new shelves up, run a partition across, and dress the windows like the shops down town.

In his eager thoughts he saw the dingy shop transformed under his touch, spick and span, alive with customers, who jostled one another as they passed in and out, the coin clinking merrily in the till.
He awoke as from a dream, and looked with dismay on the small, grimy shop keeping pace with its master's old age.

Suddenly an idea came into his head, and he stared at Paasch with a hard, calculating look in his eyes.

Then he got up, and walked abruptly out of the shop.