"But," continued Lawrence, "I believe in being safe. I feel sure that the people will respect us all the more for being armed."

"And would you use a sword, sir?" cried the lawyer fiercely.

Lawrence drew his sleeve back from his thin arm, gazed at it mournfully, and then looked up in a wistful half-laughing way at his two friends.

"I don't think I could even pull it out of the sheath," he said sadly.

"Come, Burne, you will have to yield to circ.u.mstances."

"Not I, sir, not I," said Mr Burne emphatically. "I have been too much mixed up with the law all my life, and know its beauties too well, ever to break it."

"But you will come with us to the gunsmith's?"

"Oh, yes, I'll come and see you fool away your money, only I'm not going to have you carry loaded guns near me. If they are to be for show let them be for show. There, I'm ready."

"You will lie down for an hour, Lawrence, eh?" said the professor; "it is very hot." But the lad looked so dismayed that his friend smiled and said, "Come along, then."

A few minutes later they were in a store, whose owner seemed to sell everything, from tinned meat to telescopes; and, upon hearing their wants, the shrewd, clever-looking Greek soon placed a case of revolvers before them of English and American make, exhibiting the differences of construction with clever fingers, with the result that the professor selected a Colt, and Lawrence a Tranter of a lighter make.

"He's a keen one," said Mr Burne. "What a price he is asking for these goods!"

"But they seem genuine," said the professor; for the Greek had gone to the back of his store to make some inquiry about ammunition.

"Genuine fleecing," grumbled Mr Burne; and just then the dealer returned.

"You select those two, then, gentlemen," he said in excellent English.

"But if you will allow me, sir," he continued to Lawrence, "this is a more expensive and more highly finished pistol than the other, and it is lighter in the hand; but if I were you, as my arm would grow stronger, I should have one exactly like my friend's."

"Why?" said Lawrence; "I like this one."

"It is a good choice, sir, but it requires different cartridges to your friend's, and as you are going right away, would it not be better to have to depend on one size only? I have both, but I offer the suggestion."

"Yes, that's quite right," said the old lawyer sharply; "quite right. I should have both the same; and, do you know, I think perhaps I might as well have one, in case either of you should lose yours."

Mr Preston felt ready to smile, but the speaker was looking full at him, as if in expectation thereof, and he remained perfectly serious.

The pistols having been purchased, with a good supply of ammunition, guns were brought out, and the professor invested in a couple of good useful double-barrelled fowling-pieces for himself and Lawrence; Mr Burne watching intently the whole transaction, and ending by asking the dealer to show him one.

"You see," he explained, "I should look odd to the people if I were not carrying the same weapons as you two, and besides I have often thought that I should like to go shooting. I don't see why I shouldn't; do you, Lawrence?"

"No, sir, certainly not," was the reply: and Mr Burne went on examining the gun before him, pulling the lever, throwing open the breech, and peeping through the barrels as if they formed a double telescope.

"Oh! that's the way, is it?" he said. "But suppose, when the thing goes off, the shots should come out at this end instead of the other?"

"But you don't fire it off when it's open like that, Mr Burne," cried Lawrence.

"My dear boy, of course not. Do you suppose I don't understand? You put in the cartridges like this. No, they won't go in that way. You put them in like that, and then you pull the trigger."

"No, no, no," cried Lawrence excitedly. "You shut the breech first."

"My dear boy--oh! I see. Yes, of course. Oh! that's what you meant.

Of course, of course. I should have seen that directly. Now, then, it's all right. Loaded?"

"Sir! sir! sir!" cried the dealer, but he was too late, for the old lawyer had put the gun to his shoulder, pointing the barrel towards the door, and pulled both triggers.

The result was a deafening explosion, two puffs of smoke half filling the place, and the old gentleman was seated upon the floor.

"Good gracious, Burne!" cried the professor, rushing to him, "are you much hurt?"

Lawrence caught at the chair beside him, turning ashy pale, and gazing down at the prostrate man, while quite a little crowd of people filled the shop.

"Hurt?" cried Mr Burne fiercely--"hurt? Hang it, sir, do you think a man at my time of life can be b.u.mped down upon the floor like that without being hurt?"

"But are you wounded--injured?"

"Don't I tell you, yes," cried Mr Burne, getting up with great difficulty. "I'm jarred all up the spinal column."

"But not wounded?"

"Yes, I am, sir--in my self-respect. Here, help me up. Oh, dear! Oh, lor'! Gently! Oh, my back! Oh, dear! No; I can't sit down. That's better. Ah!"

"Would you like a doctor fetched?"

"Doctor? Hang your doctor, sir. Do you think I've came out here to be poisoned by a foreign doctor. Oh, bless my soul! Oh, dear me!

Confound the gun! It's a miserable cheap piece of rubbish. Went off in my hands. Anyone shot?"

"No, sir," said the dealer quietly; "fortunately you held the muzzle well up, and the charges went out of the upper part of the door."

"Oh! you're there, are you?" cried Mr Burne furiously, as he lay back in a cane chair, whose cushion seemed to be comfortable. "How dared you put such a miserable wretched piece of rubbish as that in my hands!"

The dealer made a deprecatory gesture.

"Here, clear away all these people. Be off with you. What are you staring at? Did you never see an English gentleman meet with an accident before? Oh, dear me! Oh, my conscience! Bless my heart, I shall never get over this."

The dealer went about from one to the other of the pa.s.sers-by who had crowded in, and the grave gentlemanly Turks bowed and left in the most courteous manner, while the others, a very motley a.s.sembly, showed some disposition to stay, but were eventually persuaded to go outside, and the door was closed.

"To think of me, a grave quiet solicitor, being reduced to such a position as this. I'm crippled for life. I know I am. Serves me right for coming. Here, give me a little brandy or a gla.s.s of wine."

The latter was brought directly, and the old lawyer drank it, with the result that it seemed to make him more angry.

"Here, you, sir!" he cried to the dealer, who was most attentive; "what have you to say for yourself? It's a wonder that I did not shoot one of my friends here. That gun ought to be destroyed."

"My dear Burne," said the professor, who had taken the fowling-piece and tried the locks, c.o.c.king and rec.o.c.king them over and over again; "the piece seems to me to be in very perfect order."

"Bah! stuff! What do you know about guns?"

"Certainly I have not used one much lately, and many improvements have been made since I used to go shooting; but still I do know how to handle a gun."

"Then, sir," cried the little lawyer in a towering fury, "perhaps you will be good enough to tell me how it was that this confounded piece of mechanism went off in my hands?"