“Mr. Dixon,” said the pawnbroker, turning to Teague’s companion, “will not you and your friend wait awhile until the storm slackens? It is pleasanter here by the fire than it is outside.”
His visitors agreed with him and accepted his invitation. They seated themselves beside the stove which stood in the center of the 199 room, and from which, through little plates of isinglass, shone cheerful light from a bed of fiery coals. Both leaned back in their chairs; both turned the palms of their hands toward the stove, to receive the grateful heat; and when the old pawnbroker joined them, smiling genially as he sank into his great arm-chair, which seemed to have been made expressly for his capacious form, the same thought came to both of his guests. To this thought Dixon gave expression.
“Mr. Rumble,” he asked, “how happened it that you became a pawnbroker?”
“Well, I might say that it was by chance,” replied Rumble. “I was not bred to the business.”
“I thought not,” answered Dixon, as he and his friend exchanged knowing glances.
“I was a weaver by trade,” continued Rumble, “and until two years ago worked at that calling in England, where I was born. But I made little money at it, and when an aunt, at her death, left me five hundred pounds, I decided to come to this country and go into a new business.”
“But what put it into your head to choose that of a pawnbroker?” asked Dixon.
“Because everybody told me that larger profits were made in it than in any other. You see I am getting on in years, and I have a daughter for whom I must provide. When I die I want to leave her enough to make her comfortable.”
The street door was opened and for a moment the room was made decidedly uncomfortable by a cold blast accompanied by driving snow. Again the windows rattled, the armor clanked, and the hanging suits swung and shook their armless sleeves in the air.
A tall, slight young man, clad in well-worn black clothes, stood by the door. Although his beardless pale face was the face of youth, it was not free from the marks of care, and in his large lustrous dark eyes there was a yearning look that spoke, as plainly as words, of desires unfulfilled.