“It must have been poisoned, or else it’s mad,” said the assistant. “What’s it been eating, I wonder?”
The pawnbroker made no reply. The suggestion of poisoning was a welcome one. It was preferable to the sinister hintings of the brown man. But even if it had been poisoned it was a very singular coincidence, unless indeed the Burmese had himself poisoned it He tried to think whether it could have been possible for his visitor to have administered poison undetected.
“It’s quiet now,” said the assistant, and he opened the door a little way.
“It’s all right,” said the pawnbroker, half ashamed of his fears, “get back to the shop.”
The assistant complied, and the Jew, after sitting down a little while to persuade himself that he really had no particular interest in the matter, rose and went slowly upstairs. The staircase was badly lighted, and half way up he stumbled on something soft.
He gave a hasty exclamation and, stooping down, saw that he had trodden on the dead cat.
CHAPTER IV
At ten o’clock that night the pawnbroker sat with his friend Levi discussing a bottle of champagne, which the open-eyed assistant had procured from the public-house opposite.
“You’re a lucky man, Hyams,” said his friend, as he raised his glass to his lips. “Thirty thousand pounds! It’s a fortune, a small fortune,” he added correctively.
“I shall give this place up,” said the pawnbroker, “and go away for a time. I’m not safe here.”