“Ah, now we are getting on famously! You will hardly know your watch again, my dear sir. It is all in pieces.”
The man did not seem to know whether to look amused or angry.
“There we are!” Joe exclaimed, as he held the mortar slantingly so the audience could look inside. They, as well as the gentleman who had lent the watch, saw the crushed and bent wheels, springs and pinions of a watch, all massed together.
“Well, I couldn’t do much worse to your watch. I think you’ll agree to that, my dear sir?” said Joe to the man.
“That’s right,” he admitted, rather ruefully.
“And now to try what a little magic will do,” said Joe. “Since I have destroyed your watch, I’ll do my best to restore it.”
He poured from the mortar the fragments of a watch, putting them on the paper bag together with the pieces of glass. He then wadded them all up together, and crammed them into the mouth of a large, old-fashioned pistol.
“Now watch me closely,” Joe said.
And one may well believe the audience, as well as the man who owned the watch, did watch.