“If you like to take a cab, Levi,” he said, in a low voice so that the assistant should not hear, “I’ll pay for it.”
“I’ll take an omnibus,” said Levi, smiling quietly. “You’re getting extravagant, Hyams. Besides, fancy the humor of sitting next to a pickpocket with this on me.”
He waved a cheery farewell, and the pawnbroker, watching him from the door, scowled angrily as he saw his light-hearted friend hail an omnibus at the corner and board it. Then he went back to the shop, and his everyday business of making advances on flat-irons and other realizable assets of the neighborhood.
At ten o’clock he closed for the night, the assistant hurriedly pulling down the shutters that his time for recreation might not be unduly curtailed. He slept off the premises, and the pawnbroker, after his departure, made a slight supper, and sat revolving the affairs of the day over another of his black cigars until nearly midnight. Then, well contented with himself, he went up the bare, dirty stairs to his room and went to bed, and, despite the excitement of the evening, was soon in a loud slumber, from which he was aroused by a distant and sustained knocking.
CHAPTER II
At first the noise mingled with his dreams, and helped to form them. He was down a mine, and grimy workers with strong picks were knocking diamonds from the walls, diamonds so large that he became despondent at the comparative smallness of his own. Then he awoke suddenly and sat up with a start, rubbing his eyes. The din was infernal to a man who liked to do a quiet business in an unobtrusive way. It was a knocking which he usually associated with the police, and it came from his side door. With a sense of evil strong upon him, the Jew sprang from his bed, and, slipping the catch, noiselessly opened the window and thrust his head out. In the light of a lamp which projected from the brick wall at the other end of the alley he saw a figure below.
“Hulloa!” said the Jew harshly.
His voice was drowned in the noise.
“What do you want?” he yelled. “Hulloa, there! What do you want, I say?”
The knocking ceased, and the figure, stepping back a little, looked up at the window.