He leant over the counter, and, taking the brown man’s skinny throat in his great hand, flung him reeling back to the partition, which shook with his weight. Then he burst into a laugh as the being who had just been threatening him with a terrible and mysterious death changed into a little weak old man, coughing and spitting as he clutched at his throat and fought for breath. “What about your servant, the devil?” asked the Jew maliciously. “He serves when I am absent,” said the brown man faintly. “Even now I give you one more chance. I will let you see the young fellow in your shop die first. But no, he has not offended. I will kill—” He paused, and his eye fell on the cat, which at that moment sprang up and took its old place on the counter. “I will kill your cat,” said the brown man. “I will send the devil to worry it. Watch the cat, and as its death is so shall yours be—unless—” “Unless?” said the Jew, regarding him mockingly. “Unless to-night before ten o’clock you mark on your door-post two crosses in chalk,” said the other. “Do that and live. Watch your cat.” He pointed his lean, brown finger at the animal, and, still feeling at his throat, stepped softly to the door and passed out. With the entrance of other customers, the pawnbroker forgot the annoyance to which he had been subjected, and attended to their wants in a spirit made liberal by the near prospect of fortune. It was certain that the stone must be of great value. With that and the money he had made by his business, he would give up work and settle down to a life of pleasant ease. So liberal was he that an elderly Irishwoman forgot their slight differences in creeds and blessed him fervently with all the saints in the calendar. His assistant being back in his place in the shop, the pawnbroker returned to the little sitting-room, and once more carefully looked through the account of the sailor’s murder. Then he sat still trying to work out a problem; to hand the murderers over to the police without his connection with the stolen diamond being made public, and after considerable deliberation, convinced himself that the feat was impossible. He was interrupted by a slight scuffling noise in the shop, and the cat came bolting into the room, and, after running round the table, went out at the door and fled upstairs. The assistant came into the room. “What are you worrying the thing for?” demanded his master. “I’m not worrying it,” said the assistant in an aggrieved voice. “It’s been moving about up and down the shop, and then it suddenly started like that. It’s got a fit, I suppose.” He went back to the shop, and the Jew sat in his chair half ashamed of his nervous credulity, listening to the animal, which was rushing about in the rooms upstairs. “Go and see what’s the matter with the thing, Bob,” he cried. The assistant obeyed, returning hastily in a minute or two, and closing the door behind him. “Well, what’s the matter?” demanded his master.