They wore rings
and armlets, flat gold collars and swords, and impossible-looking
head-dresses.
A stupefied silence fell on them.
'I say,' a youth who had always been fair-haired broke that
silence, 'it's only fancy of course--something wrong with my
eyes--but you chaps do look so rum.'
'Rum,' said his friend. 'Look at YOU. You in a sash! My hat!
And your hair's gone black and you've got a beard. It's my
belief we've been poisoned. You do look a jackape.'
'Old Levinstein don't look so bad. But how was it DONE--that's
what I want to know. How was it done? Is it conjuring, or
what?'
'I think it is chust a ver' bad tream,' said old Levinstein to
his clerk; 'all along Bishopsgate I haf seen the gommon people
have their hants full of food--GOOT food. Oh yes, without doubt
a very bad tream!'
'Then I'm dreaming too, Sir,' said the clerk, looking down at his
legs with an expression of loathing. 'I see my feet in beastly
sandals as plain as plain.'
'All that goot food wasted,' said old Mr Levinstein. A bad
tream--a bad tream.'
The Members of the Stock Exchange are said to be at all times a
noisy lot. But the noise they made now to express their disgust
at the costumes of ancient Babylon was far louder than their
ordinary row. One had to shout before one could hear oneself
speak.
'I only wish,' said the clerk who thought it was conjuring--he
was quite close to the children and they trembled, because they
knew that whatever he wished would come true.
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