KINGDOM 2


The following extract comes from a novel called Click, a work of collaborative fiction, which means it was written by several different authors. The novel is about a well-known photo journalist and his two grandchildren, Jason and Margaret, and how they affected the lives of different people. This extract is from ‘Chapter 3: Jason’, written by Eoin Colfer.


Click


Kronski Antiques was an old junk shop on the third fl oor, up above the Gaps and Burger Kings – up with all the other small-time operators that couldn’t afford prime spots. But the proprietor, Dr Kronski, wasn’t like all the other shopkeepers on that level. When you came in the door, he looked at you like you were interrupting something important and he certainly did not need your business.


Jason had been here once before. Grandpa Gee had an old Civil War spyglass that he kept in a travel chest in their basement. Dr Kronski had given him twenty bucks for it. Grandpa hadn’t even noticed it was missing. Jason had felt guilty about stealing it for a couple of days, but soon the feeling had faded from neon to dull. He didn’t even think about the theft most of the time. Then Grandpa Gee died, and the guilt had fl ared up again like an infected wound, even though now his crime would never be discovered. He thought about what he had done every day, and the act made him sick to the pit of his stomach. Yet here he was back at Kronski’s shopfront again. But this time it was different, wasn’t it? This time he was only selling what he owned.


A brass bell tinkled as he pushed through the door. Jason could barely see the counter for all the junk, sorry, ‘antiques’, stacked on almost every inch of fl oor space. Whatever rent old Kronski was paying per square foot, he was defi nitely getting his money’s worth.


There were harpsichords, and candelabras, and stuffed animals, and reconstructed battle scenes, and shrunken heads, and candles made from fat and blood. Of course Jason’s brain didn’t catalogue any of this. All he saw was junk that people would pay money for.


Kronski was behind the counter. A tall, slight man wearing a fi tted black suit. His complexion was sallow, and his bald head shone orange from the overhead lights. He was busy painting a lead Napoleonic soldier, held in place with carpenter’s clamps.


He glanced up from his work, brow creased with irritation.


‘I really don’t think I can help you, boy. Perhaps you are lost. There is an arcade one fl oor down.’ Kronski’s accent was clipped. European. Jason didn’t know enough geography to pin it down, but defi nitely something on the other side of the Atlantic.


Jason raised his face. ‘Hey, Doc. It’s me, Jason.’


Kronski removed a jeweller’s glass from his eye. ‘Ah, yes. The light-fi ngered boy. The one with the eyeglass.’


Jason scowled. ‘About that spyglass. I looked that up on the Internet. It was worth eight hundred dollars; you gave me twenty.’


Kronski smiled. His teeth were small and square, like an infant’s. ‘Eight hundred, with papers of provenance. Do you have such papers?’ Jason’s silence was ample reply.


‘I thought not. That twenty dollars was a fi nder’s fee. Now, are you here to waste my time or to make some money?’


Jason turned his back for a moment, sliding one photograph from the package. It was a blurred black-and-white of two boxers in action. Their sinews were stretched, sweat streamed from their limbs, and their lips were drawn back over white gum shields.


378


provenance: details of past ownership that prove an object is genuine


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