"This reminds me--Have you got the knife? My pipe's stuffed up."

He dug it out, loaded afresh, and lit up again.

"I remember once, at a pub I was staying at, I had to leave without
saying good-bye to the landlord. I didn't know him very well at that
time.

"My room was upstairs at the back, with the window opening on to
the backyard. I always carried a bit of clothes-line in my swag or
portmanteau those times. I travelled along with a portmanteau those
times. I carried the rope in case of accident, or in case of fire, to
lower my things out of the window--or hang myself, maybe, if things got
too bad. No, now I come to think of it, I carried a revolver for that,
and it was the only thing I never pawned."

"To hang yourself with?" asked the mate.

"Yes--you're very smart," snapped Mitchell; "never mind---. This reminds
me that I got a chap at a pub to pawn my last suit, while I stopped
inside and waited for an old mate to send me a pound; but I kept the
shooter, and if he hadn't sent it I'd have been the late John Mitchell
long ago."

"And sometimes you lower'd out when there wasn't a fire."

"Yes, that will pass; you're improving in the funny business. But about
the yarn. There was two beds in my room at the pub, where I had to go
away without shouting for the boss, and, as it happened, there was a
strange chap sleeping in the other bed that night, and, just as I raised
the window and was going to lower my bag out, he woke up.

"'Now, look here,' I said, shaking my fist at him, like that, 'if you
say a word, I'll stoush yer!'

"'Well,' he said, 'well, you needn't be in such a sweat to jump down a
man's throat. I've got my swag under the bed, and I was just going to
ask you for the loan of the rope when you're done with it.'

"Well, we chummed. His name was Tom--Tom--something, I forget the other
name, but it doesn't matter. Have you got the matches?"

He wasted three matches, and continued--

"There was a lot of old galvanized iron lying about under the window,
and I was frightened the swag would make a noise; anyway, I'd have to
drop the rope, and that was sure to make a noise. So we agreed for one
of us to go down and land the swag. If we were seen going down without
the swags it didn't matter, for we could say we wanted to go out in the
yard for something."

"If you had the swag you might pretend you were walking in your sleep,"
I suggested, for the want of something funnier to say.

"Bosh," said Ja