The Rev. Simon took a cigar case from an inner pocket in his cassock. Opening it, he held it out towards Philip Avalon. It contained six cigars. The young man's bewilderment grew more and more. That the Rev. Simon Chasuble, whose fulminations against what he was wont to speak of as the "nicotine habit," had always made him seem, to his nephew, to be more or less insane, should actually produce a case of cigars from a pocket in his cassock, and offer him one to smoke, to Philip Avalon the action seemed to paint the disorder of his uncle's brain in still more vivid hues.
In his bewilderment the young man refused his uncle's offer.
"Thank you, I do not care to smoke just now."
But the Rev. Simon was insistent.
"But I say you shall, you shall! You never smoked a cigar like mine before, and you never will again!"
Again that accentuation of the chuckle. Thinking that by humouring his uncle's whim he would at least be afforded breathing space, Philip took, from the proffered case, one of the six cigars. The Rev. Simon watched him with eager eyes.
"Cut off the tip! Quick, Philip, quick!"
"What does he think he's up to now?" inquired Philip of himself. He cut off, with his penknife, the point of the cigar, and as he did so an idea came also to him. "I'll strike a match and light up; then I'll drop the match into the fireplace, and that'll give me a chance to ring the bell."
Only the first part of this programme, however, was carried into effect. He struck a match, smiling in spite of himself at the eagerness with which he perceived that his uncle watched him. He applied the lighted match to his cigar. And as the slender whiff of smoke came from between his lips, as if struck by lightning, he fell to the floor stone dead.
The Rev. Simon Chasuble's experimental essay with his ingenious contrivance for the conversion of smokers had been a complete success. He knelt beside the silent figure. He kissed his crucifix; he crossed himself.