"Very sudden, indeed," I replied, mechanically.
"Does Doctor Arbuthnot think he'll get the better of it, Mr. Basil?"
Mr. Cobbe sighed, and shook his head, and smoked in silence.
"To be struck down just when he was playing such tricks as them conjuring dodges, do seem uncommon awful," said he, after a time. "What was he after at the minute?--making a pudding, wasn't he, in some gentleman's hat?"
I uttered a sudden ejaculation, and set down my glass of negus untasted. Till that moment I had not once thought of my watch.
"Oh, Mr. Cobbe!" I cried, "he was pounding my watch in the mortar!"
"Yes, mine--and I have not seen it since. What can have become of it? What shall I do?"
"Do!" echoed the landlord, seizing a candle; "why, go and look for it, to be sure, Mr. Basil. That's safe enough, you may be sure!"
I followed him to the room where the performance had taken place. It showed darkly and drearily by the light of one feeble candle. The benches and chairs were all in disorder. The wand lay where it had fallen from the hand of the Wizard. The mortar still stood on the table, with the pestle beside it. It contained only some fragments of broken glass.
"Come, sir," said he, "the watch is safe enough, anyhow. Mounseer only made believe to pound it up, and now all that concerns us is to find it."
That was indeed all--not only all, but too much. We searched everything. We looked in all the jars and under all the moveables. We took the cover off the chair; we cleared the table; but without success. My watch had totally disappeared, and we at length decided that it must be concealed about the conjuror's person. Mr. Cobbe was my consoling angel.
"Bless you, sir," said he, "don't never be cast down. My wife shall look for the watch to-morrow morning, and I'll promise you we'll find out every pocket he has about him."
"And my father--you won't tell my father?" I said, dolefully.
Mr. Cobbe replied by a mute but expressive piece of pantomime and took me back to the bar, where the good landlady ratified all that her husband had promised in her name.
The stars shone brightly as I went home, and there was no moon. The town was intensely silent, and the road intensely solitary. I met no one on my way; let myself quietly in, and stole up to my bed-room in the dark.