Page:Pain--Stories in the dark.djvu/180

THE GRAY CAT 'That is so,' said Breddon.

'Not loaded, I trust?'

'Oh yes, fully loaded.'

'But isn't that very dangerous?'

'Well, no; I'm used to these things, and I'm not careless with them. I should have thought it more dangerous to have introduced Gray Devil to you without it. He's much more powerful than an ordinary cat, and I fancy there's something beside cat in his pedigree. When I bring a stranger to see him I keep the cat covered with the revolver until I see how the land lies. To do the brute justice, he has always been most friendly with everybody except myself. I'm his only antipathy. He'd have gone for me just now but that he's smart enough to be afraid of this.'

He tapped the revolver.

'I see,' said the Archdeacon seriously, 'and can guess how it happened. You scared him one day by firing the revolver for joke; the report frightened him, and he's 176