Colt .25

The Colt .25 is the smallest of the three pistols Travis Bickle buys as he prepares for an armed political attack. Its lightness and ease of concealment make it central to his effort to turn a private plan into an executable one: he modifies a shirt and devises a spring-driven mechanism to bring the pistol from his forearm into his hand. The gun later appears in his hand during a violent confrontation, but the narration identifies the .38 Special—not the Colt—as the weapon he fires.

Purchase and Description

At Andy’s gun shop, Travis first asks for a small pistol, pointing to what he thinks is a .22. Andy identifies it as a Colt .25 and presents it as a compact, rapidly usable weapon: it would do comparatively little damage, he says, but could be carried almost anywhere. Travis handles it and finds it strikingly light, like a toy. The contrast between its modest weight and its potential use gives the object an unsettling quality even before he explains what he intends to do with it.

The Colt is not bought alone. Travis chooses it with a .44 Magnum and a .38 Special, declining Andy’s offer of an automatic. Andy asks an additional $150 for the Colt; the final quoted price for all three guns and a holster is $700. Travis then asks about a permit. Andy estimates that one would cost at least $5,000, perhaps $6,000, and take a long time to obtain. The exchange establishes the Colt as one item in a deliberate arsenal, while leaving the permit question unresolved.

Concealment and Intended Use

As Travis’s plan to assassinate Charles Palantine takes shape, the Colt becomes part of a system designed to hide weapons on his body. He attaches metal tracks along the inside of his forearm so the pistol can remain concealed behind it, then arranges for a spring near his elbow to send it sliding into his palm. He cuts a Western shirt to accommodate the mechanism. The plan turns the gun from something carried openly into an engineered extension of his body, requiring clothing, hardware, and practiced movement to make the weapon accessible without being immediately visible.

Concealment proves difficult. The guns leave visible bulges, and Travis layers two Western shirts, a sweater, and a jacket to hide them. The resulting bulk makes him look dressed for an Arctic winter despite the warming weather. His preparation also includes attaching a military combat knife to his calf and practicing with the .44 Magnum; he marks the heads of forty-four bullets with an X and aims the .38 Special at a poster of Palantine. These details distinguish the Colt’s particular role: it is the weapon assigned the hidden, spring-loaded place on his arm, within a larger plan whose other weapons are also laboriously arranged and concealed.

Appearance in the Later Violence

In a later confrontation, Travis’s right arm strikes a wall and he feels something hard slide into his hand. The narration then identifies the object as the Colt .25. He fires continuously with his .38 Special at the man he calls Gros Lard; the Colt’s presence in his hand is therefore not evidence that he uses it to shoot in that moment. The distinction matters: the pistol designed for concealed deployment is physically present, but the passage specifies another weapon as the one fired.

After the man falls and Iris screams, someone else attacks Travis, and he loses the Colt. The sequence gives the weapon a concrete aftermath beyond its planned role: it passes into his hand amid the violence, then disappears from his possession as the struggle continues. The text does not establish whether the forearm mechanism itself released it, or what becomes of the pistol after it is lost.

Meaning in Travis’s Arsenal

The Colt’s smallness links practicality with Travis’s attempt to make violence controllable. Andy emphasizes that it can be carried nearly anywhere; Travis’s improvised tracks, spring, and altered shirt answer that promise with a technical scheme for hidden access. Yet the preparations also expose the gap between a carefully rehearsed design and the disorder of actual violence: the Colt reaches his hand, but the shooting described belongs to the .38 Special, and the Colt is soon lost.

Travis’s choice to describe it as a small “pistol for a lady” also places the purchase within his gendered language about weapons. Elsewhere he associates violence with proving himself a man and imagines Betsy’s reaction to his actions. The Colt does not resolve that tension; rather, its diminutive, easily hidden form becomes one instrument in a broader effort to make himself consequential through force. Its narrative importance lies both in that intended function and in the abrupt, limited role it actually plays.