Worth a shot, anyway. If nothing else, perhaps speaking to the janitor will distract Jim enough that the kneazle can sneak inside, if he'd like to try anyway.

"Excuse me," Jim calls out to the other person. "I've got kinda a weird question. Do you know how I could get my hands on a scale from this bad boy here?" He punctuates it by waving vaguely towards the basilisk enclosure.