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“Look here,” said one. “Is it loaded?”

“Of course,” said the alderman.

“Ball cartridge?”

“Of course,” said the alderman.

“Well, would you mind putting it back in your pocket–with all this wine and whisky about–“

The alderman complied, proud.

He was limping goutily home with the Vice, at something after midnight, when, as they passed the stage-door of the Empire, both men were aware of fearsome sounds within the building. And the stage-door was ajar. Being personages of great importance, they entered into the interior gloom and collided with the watchman, who was rushing out.

“Is that you, Alderman Keats?” exclaimed the watchman. “Thank Heaven!”

The alderman then learnt that two of Hagentodt’s Bengal tigers were having an altercation about a lady, and that it looked like a duel to the death. (Yet one would have supposed that after two performances, at eight-thirty and ten-thirty respectively, those tigers would have been too tired and bored to quarrel about anything whatever.) The watchman had already fetched Hagentodt from his hotel, but Hagentodt’s revolver was missing–could not be found anywhere, and the rivals were in such a state of fury that even the unique Hagentodt would not enter their cage without a revolver. Meanwhile invaluable tigers were being mutually destructive, and the watchman was just off to the police-station to borrow a revolver.

The roaring grew terrific.

“Have you got your revolver, Alderman Keats?” asked the watchman.

“No,” said the alderman, “I haven’t.”

“Oh!” said the Vice. “I thought I saw you showing it to your cousin and some others.”

At the same moment Joe and some others, equally attracted by the roaring, strolled in.

The alderman hesitated.

“Yes, of course; I was forgetting.”

“If you’ll lend it to the professor a minute or so?” said the watchman.

The alderman pulled it out of his pocket, and hesitatingly handed it to the watchman, and the watchman was turning hurriedly away with it when the alderman said nervously:

“I’m not sure if it’s loaded.”

“Well, you’re a nice chap!” Joe Keats put in.

“I forget,” muttered the alderman.

“We’ll soon see,” said the watchman, who was accustomed to revolvers. And he opened it. “Yes,” glancing into it, “it’s loaded right enough.”

And turned away again towards the sound of the awful roaring.

“I say,” the alderman cried, “I’m afraid it’s only blank cartridge.”

He might have saved his reputation by allowing the unique Hagentodt to risk his life with a useless revolver. But he had a conscience. A clear conscience was his sole compensation as he faced the sardonic laughter which Joe led and which finished off his reputation as a dog of the old sort. The annoying thing was that his noble self-sacrifice was useless, for immediately afterwards the roaring ceased, Hagentodt having separated the combatants by means of a burning newspaper at the end of a stick. And the curious thing was that Alderman Keats never again mentioned his gout.