“Take your pick,” said the pawnbroker, going to the shop and returning with two or three secondhand revolvers and some cartridges.
“I never fired one in my life,” said Levi dubiously, “but I believe the chief thing is to make a bang. Which’ll make the loudest?”
On his friend’s recommendation he selected a revolver of the service pattern, and, after one or two suggestions from the pawnbroker, expressed himself as qualified to shoot anything between a chimney-pot and a paving-stone.
“Make your room-door fast to-night, and tomorrow let Bob have a bed there,” he said earnestly, as he rose to go. “By the way, why not make those chalk marks on the door just for the night? You can laugh at them to-morrow. Sort of suggestion of the Passover about it, isn’t there?”
“I’m not going to mark my door for all the assassins that ever breathed,” said the Jew fiercely, as he rose to see the other out.
“Well, I think you’re safe enough in the house,” said Levi. “Beastly dreary the shop looks. To a man of imagination like myself it’s quite easy to fancy that there is one of your brown friend’s pet devils crouching under the counter ready to spring.”
The pawnbroker grunted and opened the door.
“Poof, fog,” said Levi, as a cloud streamed in. “Bad night for pistol practice. I shan’t be able to hit anything.”
The two men stood in the doorway for a minute, trying to peer through the fog. A heavy, measured tread sounded in the alley; a huge figure loomed up, and, to the relief of Levi, a constable halted before them.
“Thick night, sir,” said he to the pawnbroker.