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 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 VOL. I.
 
 PRINTED BY 
 
 SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW STREET SQUARE 
 
 LONDON
 
 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 RY 
 
 JUSTIN M'^CARTHY 
 
 AUTHOR OF 'dear LADY DISDAIN* ' DONNA QUIXOTE* 'CAMIOLA 
 ' THE COMET OF A SEASON " ETC. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES— VOL. L 
 
 ITonbon 
 CHATTO & WINDUS, PICCADILLY 
 
 1S93
 
 Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 
 in 2009 with funding from 
 
 University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/reddiamonds01mcca
 
 
 V. 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 j OF 
 
 /^ THE FIRST VOLUME 
 
 \ 
 
 CHAPTER PAGK 
 
 I. THE VOYAGERS 1 
 
 II. THE 31 AN FROM AFAR 18 
 
 III. A STKAXGE STORY 55 
 
 IV. IX THE DOORWAY 81 
 
 •i V. WHAT HAPPENED IX ST. JAMES's STREET . . . 95 
 
 "^ VI. MR. RATT GUXDY 110 
 
 VII. FIDELIA LOCKE 133 
 
 VIIJ. THE POCKET-BOOK 158 
 
 IX. THE CULTURE COLLEGE 174 
 
 ^ X. A xixE days' woxder 198 
 
 '^ XI. AX IXTERVIEW WITH MR. RATT GTJXDY . . . . 218 
 
 r- 
 
 ^ XII. A MASTER OF FEXCE 251 
 
 /^ 

 
 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE VOYAGERS 
 
 \ The Voyagers' Club considered itself to be a 
 very remarkable institution. It stood in St. 
 James's Square, on the north side, where it 
 occupied a stately mansion that had been suf- 
 ficiently famous in the days of the Georges. 
 Indeed, strangers of a literary turn of mind who 
 visited the club often confessed to much 
 mental fluttering and exultation as they looked 
 at the wide hall and the spacious rooms, fair 
 with the graceful ornamentation of the last 
 century. They declared that their imagination 
 VOL. I. B
 
 2 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 revived the past ; that for them once again the 
 flambeaux flickered in the lackeys' hands ; 
 once again the square was choked with the 
 chairs and the carriages of the great ; once again 
 the staircase was thronged with the shadows 
 of the statesmen, the ambassadors, the wits and 
 soldiers, the poets and proconsuls who made 
 the Hanoverian rule illustrious. 
 
 The Voyagers themselves, however, seldom 
 wasted much time in such contemplations. 
 They were a new club, and they were proud 
 of their newness, and felt as a body the very 
 slightest sympathy with the people of the past. 
 The present was good enough for them, they 
 maintained, and they lived in and for the 
 present with a persistent activity which was 
 gradually making them famous. If, indeed, 
 a bust of Herodotus adorned their library, if 
 portraits of Hakluyt and Columbus stared 
 down upon the smokers in the smoking-room,
 
 THE VOYAGERS 3 
 
 these were the only worthies of antiquity for 
 whom the Voyagers professed any special 
 reverence. For it was modern travel which 
 the Voyagers considered themselves especially 
 to represent — that modern travel which has 
 linked Constantinople with Paris, which has 
 so astonishingly abridged the distance between 
 Liverpool and Xew York, between England 
 and India, between America and Japan, and 
 which has schemed out its great scheme of 
 the Euphrates Valley railroad. 
 
 The Voyagers were men of the moment 
 who liked to travel far, but who liked, above 
 all things, to travel fast ; practical men who 
 would hke to put railways everywhere, and 
 who laughed contemptuously at the faddy 
 and fussy persons who sighed with Mr. Euskin 
 for the old days of pack-saddle and stacre- 
 coach. 
 
 Their sympathies lay more in the direction 
 
 B 2
 
 4 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 of Jules Yerne and the mighty conceptions 
 of his mind ; the men who put a girdle round 
 the world in eighty days, who hoped for 
 excursions to the moon and to the centre of 
 the earth, and who dreamed of altering the 
 axis of the globe in order to make use of the 
 ultimate realms of the Pole. So when the 
 members of the Voyagers' Club were not 
 racing across South America, or planning 
 railways in Persia, or dreaming of annexations 
 in the islands of the South Seas ; when they 
 were at home beneath their pleasant roof-tree 
 in St. James's Square, they thought very little 
 of the politicians and the poets of the last 
 century who had once gloried and drunk deep 
 within the same walls. Their thoughts were 
 with Sir Eichard Burton and Mr. H. M. Stanley, 
 with Johnston of Kilimanjaro and Sir Samuel 
 Baker. The club entertained divided opinions 
 as to the merits of a Channel Tunnel or a
 
 THE VOYAGERS 5 
 
 Channel Bridge, and it held in affectionate 
 reverence the name of Mr. Pullman. 
 
 If ever an expedition was to be started 
 for the exploration of some untravelled tract 
 of land in the hottest heart of Asia, or for the 
 rescue of some traveller who had disappeared, 
 adventurous, into the darkest part of darkest 
 Africa, members of the Voyagers' Club were 
 sure to be found among the organisers of tlie 
 expedition, and the smoking-room would be 
 converted into a kind of permanent committee- 
 room for the expedition until it was fairly 
 started. The Eoyal Geographical Society 
 boasted no more enterprising fellows upon its 
 roll than those whose names were also to be 
 found set down in the members' list of the 
 Voyagers' Club in St. James's Square. 
 
 In fact, the Voyagers' Club was a very 
 characteristic creation of an age that above all 
 things loves to wander, an age when civilised
 
 6 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 men, children of generations of civic life, 
 become as restless as the nomad Arabs, and 
 wander feverishly hither and thither, having 
 no home and yet at home everywhere, even as 
 the gipsies. The club was the centre of a great 
 network of travel, exploration, and adventure : 
 sitting in its smoking-room even the laziest of 
 mankind felt himself in a kind of personal 
 communication with the uttermost ends of the 
 earth, with Bagdad, and Bolivia, and Benares, 
 and Ballarat — nay, even felt, so strong was the 
 heady influence of the place, that it was his 
 own immediate duty at once to arise and 
 shake the dust of cities from his shoes, and 
 journey day and night to the land of Prester 
 John or the other remoter land east of the 
 sun, west of the moon. 
 
 But if the Voyagers as a body were 
 go-a-head men, tearing across the world 
 eternally, as though the devil was at their
 
 THE VOYAGERS 7 
 
 heels, and despising the terra ' globe-trotters,' 
 it must not be supposed that all its members 
 were thus desperately adventurous. The 
 club was a young club, barely a year in 
 working existence. It had been started by 
 a little handful of tough travellers of the 
 newest school, but there were not enough 
 of such tough travellers easily obtainable 
 at short notice to make up a successful 
 club, and so the tough travellers were 
 obliged to compromise a little. 
 
 ' Life is all compromise,' Captain the 
 Honourable John Raven had observed sen- 
 ten tiou sly when the club was still in 
 embryo. Few men had travelled more for 
 his time of life — for he was still a youngish 
 man — than Captain the Honourable John 
 Raven, whom his playful friends called 
 Captain Jackdaw. A man has not been a 
 Queen's Messenger, and a special corre-
 
 8 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 spondent, and a soldier of the Queen, and a 
 soldier of fortune, all for nothing ; and John 
 Kaven had seen a great deal of the world 
 and its ways before he came to the shaping 
 of the Voyagers' Club. So when he said that 
 life was all compromise his committee col- 
 leagues of the unborn Voyagers agreed with 
 him, and accordingly they compromised. 
 
 It was agreed and made plain through 
 the medium of the public press that a man 
 might very well be a Voyager without having 
 explored Central Africa like Lovatt Cameron, 
 or Beloochistan like Ernest Floyer. In fact, 
 the club committee decided that anyone who 
 had ever travelled a thousand miles from 
 London was by that fact qualified for mem- 
 bership of the Voyagers' Club, and entitled 
 up to a certain date to election without 
 entrance fee if his other qualifications were 
 considered acceptable. Such was Captain
 
 THE VOYAGERS 9 
 
 Jackdaw's compromise, and it bore good 
 fruit. The number of people who wanted 
 to become Voyagers proved to be very great, 
 and in quite a short time the original hmit 
 was reached, a heavy entrance fee was fixed, 
 and the Voyagers took its place among the 
 most flourishing of young clubs in London. 
 
 Gerald Aspen was very fond of the 
 Voyagers' Club, partly perhaps because it 
 was the only club to which he had the privi- 
 lege of belonging, but chiefly because of its 
 name and its associations. He was very 
 grateful to the compromise which, as he 
 considered, had allowed him to enter the 
 club, for he could not consider himself, in 
 the serious sense, a Voyager at all. He had 
 certainly fulfilled the primal qualification. 
 He had been more than a thousand miles 
 from London. If a man employs a month's 
 holiday in going to Xew York and back on
 
 lo RED DIAMONDS 
 
 the off chance of picking up some information 
 about a lost father, he has travelled a good 
 deal more than a thousand miles from London, 
 and that was the extent of Gerald Aspen's 
 serious voyaging. He had, it is true, 
 knocked about the Continent a good deal. 
 He had been bear-leader to a solemn young 
 cub, the son of a City magnate, whom he had 
 been entrusted with, and with whom he 
 made what his great-grandfather would have 
 called the Grand Tour. He had had a good 
 time, and kept his cub out of all manner of 
 mischief, holding his paws and muzzle from 
 many varieties of unwholesome honey. His 
 bear-leading had brought him enough money 
 to make that little trip to New York which 
 had resulted in failure so far as its object 
 was concerned, but in success so far as it 
 qualified him for membership of the 
 Voyagers.
 
 THE VOYAGERS li 
 
 Still he might never have been a member 
 of the Voyagers if it had not been for Captain 
 Jackdaw. Gerald had met John Eaven in 
 Prague first on that famous bear-leading 
 tour expedition, and again in Vienna, and 
 the pair had struck up a strongish friendship 
 of the kind that men do strike up in foreign 
 towns. So when Gerald Aspen found himself 
 in London with his way to make as a jour- 
 nalist, and rich with all the inestimable privi- 
 leges that four guineas a week offer to the 
 ambitious, he came across the announcement 
 of the Voyagers' Club in the newspaper to 
 which he was devoted, and saw the name of 
 John Eaven on the committee. Gerald was 
 almost unknown in London ; he knew that it 
 would be a very convenient thing for him to 
 belong to a club ; he had something in his 
 blood of that wandering spirit which made it 
 tingle at the thought of Voyagers. Besides,
 
 12 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 in such a club, who knows, bringing together 
 as it would men from all the ends of the 
 earth, he might very possibly some day come 
 across somebody who could tell him some- 
 thing of that long-lost father? At least it 
 was not impossible. It was always Gerald's 
 dream, and the Voyagers offered a better 
 chance than any other that lay in his way. 
 So he wrote to Eaven, setting forth his claims 
 and recalling the old Continental friendship, 
 and waited somewhat anxiously for the result. 
 The result came rapidly in the form of a 
 letter from the secretary informing him that 
 he had been duly elected a member of the 
 Voyagers' Club, and requesting him to forward 
 his subscription. The subscription was eight 
 guineas, and Gerald felt a certain thrill of 
 blended pain and pleasure as he made out on 
 his almost virgin cheque-book a cheque for 
 that, to him, enormous sum.
 
 THE VOYAGERS 13 
 
 All this was long ago — almost a year ago. 
 Gerald felt quite an old member of the club 
 now. He came there every day. He was 
 very fond of it. A young man alone in 
 London, especially a young man who is 
 country-bred, who lives in chambers, and has 
 no relatives and few friends, gets naturally to 
 be fond of his club. It means companionship, 
 it means comfort, it imparts an agreeable 
 sense of being in and of the great world of 
 London. He feels that he is neither friendless 
 nor alone as he passes through the swinging 
 doors and finds himself the temporary master >. 
 of a surprising amount of comfort, and even 
 of luxury, in return for his modest yearly 
 subscription. There was a young gentleman 
 once of the name of Brown whose uncle grave 
 him some very good advice on the occasion 
 of his being elected to that very illustrious 
 institution, the Megatherium. But that was
 
 14 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 many years ago, and the club world of London 
 has multiplied amazingly since those days. 
 
 It was a business to get into a club in 
 those days ; it is a business to get into a good 
 many clubs still ; but there are a great many 
 more clubs now than there were then, and 
 the young soldier of fortune, the eager young 
 journalist like Gerald Aspen, can, without 
 making any serious encroachment upon his 
 income, find himself privileged to spend a 
 solid part of his day within the walls of build- 
 ings that would have appeared indeed palatial 
 to the struggling young journalist of a genera- 
 tion and a half ago. Not that Gerald Aspen 
 could now be described as a struggling 
 journalist. He considered that he had been 
 very lucky. When his father had vanished 
 years ago into outer darkness Gerald, then a 
 child, was left in the care of a maiden aunt in 
 the country, and with that maiden aunt he
 
 THE VOYAGERS 15 
 
 had lived until she died. Then he came to 
 London with two purposes — to find his father 
 and to make his fortune. 
 
 So far he had done neither, but he was 
 a prominent and responsible member of the 
 staff of an enterprising journal. 
 
 Gerald's newspaper was a weekly journal 
 of the new school. It was the representative 
 of advanced journalism, as the Voyagers' Club 
 was the representative of advanced travel. 
 It gave Gerald plenty to do, for Gerald was 
 able and willing and well-informed and weU- 
 read — he had been well educated in that quiet 
 country town — and wrote a fluent, pleasant 
 style, and was really quite worth the six 
 guineas a week to which he had now been 
 advanced, and which he regarded with pardon- 
 able pride as a very comfortable, not to say 
 enormous, income. To write for the ' Cata- 
 pult,' to belong to the Voyagers' Club, to
 
 1 6 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 have comfortable tiny chambers in a building 
 behind the Strand which looked over the 
 gardens of the Thames Embankment and the 
 stately river — what more could a young man 
 wish for? 
 
 What, indeed, if only he knew where his 
 father was, or what had become of him ? But, 
 then, as Gerald had never known his father, 
 this inquiry, though it occupied his thoughts 
 a good deal, and had guided his actions, at all 
 events, on one occasion, did not poignantly 
 harass him or darken his existence. He had 
 a kind of impression that he should find his 
 father some day. Even if he did not it would 
 not greatly matter. It was a mystery, indeed, 
 but not a mystery of a kind which compelled 
 solution at the risk of poisoning all happiness 
 if the mystery was left unsolved. 
 
 In the meantime Gerald's business in life 
 was to work, and to work well, for the
 
 THE VOYAGERS 17 
 
 ' Catapult,' to study London as the battle- 
 ground of his life, and to cherish that affec- 
 tionate regard for the Voyagers' Club which 
 it is the instinct of man as a domestic animal 
 to entertain for some set of four walls or other 
 somewhere. 
 
 VOL I.
 
 1 8 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 CHAPTEE II 
 
 THE MAN FEOM AFAR 
 
 It was an evening in late April. Gerald 
 Aspen sat at a little table in the dining-room 
 of the Voyagers — a little table that he was 
 especially fond of. It was a window-table, 
 and now, as the blinds were not drawn, he 
 could look out into the darkness beyond 
 and see the black bulk of the square, cinc- 
 tured by its stars of light, burning with a 
 gemlike brilHancy in the clear air. It had 
 been a cold, raw April, as April often is, 
 and it was very pleasant to sit there in the 
 warm bright room with its soft carpets and its 
 crimson-shaded lamps and candles, and its 
 bright fire at either end, and to look out upon
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR 19 
 
 that vague mass of light and darkness, which 
 a famous painter would call a harmony in gold 
 and sable, and dehcately appreciate without 
 experiencing the stinging chill of the atmo- 
 sphere outside. A whimsical recollection 
 crossed Gerald's mind of that old poetic tale 
 of the bird which flew for a moment out 
 of the wintry darkness into the blazing hall 
 and then flew out again, and how the wise 
 man commented thereupon and saw in the 
 swift passage of the bird from darkness 
 through light to darkness an allegory of the 
 life of man. 
 
 The dining-room of the Voyagers was an 
 exceedingly pleasant room. Between seven 
 and nine it was generally pretty crowded with 
 men of all ages and types — from the smart 
 young men about town, brilliantly attired, who 
 banqueted there with other splendid creatures 
 like themselves, on their way to the Gaiety 
 
 2
 
 20 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 Theatre, to grizzled explorers, with skins hke 
 old mahogany, who strolled about London in 
 a garb that suggested more the jungle and the 
 reedy African river than the neighbourhood of 
 Piccadilly. 
 
 Here came men who knew, and Hked the 
 Never-never Land better than Piccadilly ; men 
 who still cherished the theory that Leichardt 
 might yet be lingering in extreme old age 
 somewhere in the core of aboriginal brush ; 
 men who had known themselves what it was 
 to lose their way in desolate Australasian 
 deserts ; men who found their champagne the 
 more grateful because of their memories of 
 times when they had well-nigh perished of 
 thirst in the trackless, waterless wastes at the 
 other end of the world. Here came men who 
 had served under half the battle-flags of the 
 world. You might hear animated controversies 
 going on any day between soldiers of fortune
 
 THE MAX FROM AFAR 21 
 
 who had fought on opposite sides at Gettys- 
 burg, in Mexico, in Crete, in Spain ; who had 
 served Federal and Confederate cause ; who 
 had fought for the Turk and the Greek, and the 
 CarUst and the Commune ; men who had 
 served China in the Ever victorious Armv ; 
 men who knew the terraces of Khartoum as 
 well as they knew the club windows in St. 
 James's Square. Here came men to whom all 
 travel was but an aid to the cause of 
 science, who would have explored all South 
 America for a new beetle or a new bud. 
 Here came the men who organised faatastic 
 expeditions for the discovery of buried cities 
 and buried treasures. Here came the men of 
 means who combined exploration with all the 
 luxuries of civihsation, who travelled with an 
 army of camp followers, who never took a 
 meal without champagne, and who made it a 
 point to dress for dinner in che centre of
 
 22 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 Sahara or on the summit of Chimborazo. 
 Here too came those men who could journey 
 for days on a handful of dates, the anchorites of 
 travel. 
 
 Gerald in his own mind had baptised the 
 Voyagers' dining-room the ' Place of Strange 
 Parting.' It was a common thing, a matter 
 of daily occurrence, for men to dine there 
 together, one of whom, towards the close of 
 the meal, would glance at his watch, spring 
 up, shake hands all round, and disappear, 
 while his friends cried after him, 'Safe 
 returns.' 
 
 Then if you listened to their talk you 
 would learn that the departing one was just 
 off on an exploration to the Mountains of the 
 Moon, or the hidden cities of Thibet, or the 
 South Pole, or some such trifling trip. 
 
 Men were always rushing away from the 
 Voyagers to catch trains that were to carry
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR 23 
 
 them off — a stage on their way — to the utter- 
 most ends of the earth. 
 
 Men were often coming back too — but not 
 quite so often, for the Voyagers' Club had its 
 record of glory in the Caucasus and in Crim 
 Tartary, in Burmah, and the elephant haunts 
 of the Cape — with a deeper tint of the 
 shadowed livery of the burnished sun upon 
 their faces, with a thought more silver in their 
 hair. When these men came back after 
 absences of long months, after desperate and 
 deadly adventures, they were greeted by their 
 friends with as much composure as if they 
 had been for a Saturday- to-Mond ay at Brighton 
 or a week in Paris. It was the purpose in 
 life of most of the Voyagers to storm across 
 the earth ' Hke the wind's blast, never resting 
 homeless,' as Schiller says of the soldiers of 
 Wallenstein. 
 
 Any one of them would have been amazed
 
 24 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 indeed if anyone else made a fuss about him 
 on his return from the Sandwich Islands, or 
 Japan, or Peru. They came and went on 
 their wild flights with absolute indifference, 
 and if the bones of some of them whitened the 
 drear desert or lay rotting in mid-African 
 rivers those who survived wasted no breath in 
 regrets. The pathless desert, the untracked 
 river, these were fitting resting-places for 
 such restless spirits — fitting as the battle-field 
 to the soldier or the hunting-field to the 
 hunter. 
 
 On this particular evening in April, when 
 Gerald was sitting at his familiar table, the 
 room was uncommonly full. The waiters were 
 exceedingly busy, the steward of the chib, a 
 popular person with a face Uke a diplomatist's, 
 walked gravely hither and thither, and saw 
 that all went well. Most of the men who were 
 present were in evening dress, as Gerald was
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR 25 
 
 himself, for he was going later on to a festive 
 function at a big hotel, for which a card had 
 been sent to the ' Catapult.' The tables were 
 very white and bright, and ghttering with 
 glass, and there were pretty flowers in quaint 
 Venetian vessels on all the tables — a pretty 
 Voyagers' custom — and the softly- shaded 
 lights lent a very tender tone to the colour 
 and the contrasts of the room. 
 
 The table at which Gerald sat was the only 
 table in the room at which there was a vacant 
 seat. It was a table intended for two persons^ 
 though at a pinch it could be made to accom- 
 modate four ; but this evening the pinch was 
 not felt, and Gerald, as he ate his dinner, sat 
 with an empty chair facing him. Usually he 
 dined in company with some club acquaint- 
 ance, but on this particular evening no one 
 had turned up to join him, so he sat alone very 
 contentedly, looking over the room every now
 
 26 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 and then with the eye of a man to whom ob- 
 servation is a business, and ate his modest 
 meal and supped his modest claret, and occa- 
 sionally glanced at the evening paper which 
 lay on the table beside him. He felt in a very 
 contented mood. He had passed a very busy 
 day, he looked forward to a pleasant evening, 
 for he was still young enough to like crowds 
 and rushes and functions, even when they came 
 as a matter of business, and not of planned 
 pleasure. 
 
 When he had exhausted the evening 
 paper, when he had noted with the trained 
 journalistic eye the matters of moment which 
 would afford him opportunity for comment, 
 for satire or support ; when he had weighed 
 with complacent authority the merits of con- 
 flicting cabinets and chancelleries, and settled 
 with offhand abruptness the affairs of Europe, 
 Asia, Africa, America, and the Antipodes ;
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR 27 
 
 when he had smiled over an essay signed by 
 the initials of his favourite author, and 
 frowned over a criticism which clashed with 
 his own opinions, Gerald felt the need of 
 further mental sustenance. 
 
 He had not nearly finished his dinner and 
 he had quite finished his paper. Then he 
 remembered that he had in his pocket several 
 letters which he had brought along with him 
 with the intention of reading them in the club, 
 and of answering them after dinner in the 
 smoking-room, before starting on his way to 
 his festivity. He now pulled them out of 
 his tail-pocket and began to consider them. 
 Most of them were unimportant — invitations 
 to private views of picture-galleries, cards for 
 amateur concerts, tickets for matinees^ ad- 
 missions to scientific lectures and to scientific 
 discussions. Gerald went in for being an all- 
 round young man.
 
 28 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 The advanced journalist, like Bacon, has 
 taken all knowledge for his province, and the 
 proprietors of the ' Catapult,' finding that 
 Gerald could write with an agreeable air of 
 information upon a variety of topics, gave 
 him a good deal of rather miscellaneous occu- 
 pation. 
 
 Among Gerald's letters there was one, 
 however, which seemed to promise interest. 
 It was a card of invitation from Lady Scardale 
 to the editor of the ' Catapult,' bidding that 
 distinguished personage to a ceremonial at 
 her Culture College in Chelsea. 
 
 The editor had handed it over to Gerald. 
 ' Look here,' he said, ' this is just the 
 sort of thing for you. You are a young fel- 
 low and I am an old fogey ' — he was, as a 
 matter of fact, a man of about five-and- 
 thirty, but he thought the affectation of 
 age an adjunct to the editorial dignity. ' It
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR 29 
 
 will just suit you to go and look at a lot of 
 women.' 
 
 Gerald had mildly suggested that it de- 
 pended a good deal upon who composed the 
 ' lot of women,' but his editor waved him 
 down. 
 
 ' That will be all right,' he said. ' They 
 are sure to be mostly young and mostly pretty. 
 Lady Scardale's is a wonderful place, quite 
 like the thing in " Tlie Princess," you know, 
 " sweet girl graduates in their golden hair '' 
 and all the rest of it. Fix us up a column.' 
 
 So the editor thrust the card into Gerald's 
 hand and turned with a great air of gravity 
 to his desk again. 
 
 Now Gerald, seated at his table, studied 
 the card with interest. He had heard of Lady 
 Scardale, of course ; everybody had heard 
 of Lady Scardale and her enterprise — her 
 excellent enterprise according to some, her
 
 30 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 eccentric enterprise according to others. 
 The card was issued in the name of Lady 
 Scardale as president, and of Fidelia T^ocke 
 as vice-president, of the Culture College, 
 Chelsea, and bade its recipient to a ceremonial 
 afternoon in honour of the first anniversary 
 of its existence. 
 
 ' Fidelia Locke ! ' Gerald said to himself. 
 ' What a pretty name ! I wonder if the 
 woman is as pretty as her name. Probably 
 not ; possibly a frump in blue spectacles, with 
 terrible views of life and a taste for baggy 
 umbrellas. I should think it will be rather a 
 tedious business altogether — afternoon cere- 
 monials always are. Still it may make 
 "copy."' 
 
 Gerald dearly liked to assure himself that 
 he looked upon the whole of the orbed earth 
 merely as a subject for ' copy,' that he con- 
 sidered all its events, from the fall of a dynasty
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR 31 
 
 to the first night of a new piece, solely as a 
 matter to be recorded with more or less skill 
 in the columns of the ' Catapult ' by a quite 
 unimpassioned, impartial, and serene philo- 
 sopher, to wit, himself. 
 
 As a matter of fact he was not at all the 
 solemn personage he conceived himself to be, 
 but an exceedingly healthy young man, with 
 plenty of healthy interests in life and a very 
 creditable adaptability for j ournalism. Though 
 he professed to himself to be slightly bored 
 at the prospect of the afternoon ceremonial at 
 the Culture College, Chelsea, he was in his 
 heart decidedly interested. 
 
 He had heard a good deal of Lady 
 Scardale's little scheme for setting up a sort 
 of miniature Girton or Yassar by the rushing 
 Thames in the old world of Chelsea, and he 
 already saw in his mind's eye a very agreeable 
 column of copy, full of the portentous erudition
 
 32 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 and familiarity with the names of illustrious 
 masters so dear to youth. Then, too, he 
 should know what Fidelia Locke was like. 
 
 ' Yes, it is a pretty name,' he said again. 
 
 Quite suddenly his attention was diverted 
 from the Culture College and Fidelia Locke 
 by the entry of a new comer into the room. 
 The new comer stood just inside the doorway, 
 looking somewhat dubiously at the crowded 
 room. He was a tall, strongly-made, loosely 
 built man ; he had a large face whose native 
 ruddiness had been deepened by time into a 
 red- brick glow. This fiery face was crowned 
 by a great mass of hair and fringed by a great 
 mass of beard of the orange-yellow colour of 
 vivid flame. The stranger seemed to have a 
 taste for strongly-marked colouring in his 
 attire as well as his person, for he wore a loose, 
 well-worn tweed suit of a yellow-ochre hue, 
 and the attractions of a rather soiled and very
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR 33 
 
 blue shirt were enhanced by a necktie of 
 crimson silk, also soiled and frayed. 
 
 Many diners looked up as well as Gerald, 
 gazing in wonder at the singular apparition, 
 whose wide, good humoured, flaming face 
 slowdy moved as his eyes travelled round the 
 room in search of a vacant seat. The diplo- 
 matic steward was at his side in a moment 
 with counsel and suggestion. Then, rather 
 to his horror, Gerald saw that the parti- 
 coloured giant was making his somewhat 
 lumbering way towards the table at which he 
 sat. It was rude to stare, but the strange 
 figure exercised a kind of fascination over 
 Gerald, and he watched it cross the room and 
 bring itself to a halt directly opposite to him. 
 Then the parti-coloured giant laid an enormous 
 liaud on the back of the vacant chair opposite 
 to Gerald — it was a very enormous hand, and 
 Gerald dropping his eyes to wonder at its 
 
 VOL. I. D
 
 34 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 massiveness noticed that his little finger, if 
 anything about the hand could be called little, 
 was crraced with a rino^ in which an enormous 
 diamond blazed and twinkled. The yellow- 
 ochre figure leaned forward, the very red 
 mouth in the very red face opened, and Gerald 
 found that he was being addressed. 
 
 ' Say, stranger, have you any objection if I 
 happen in here along of you ? ' 
 
 The accent and speech were American, but 
 not American alone it seemed to Gerald. 
 
 He looked up quickly from the large hand 
 and its large brilliant and answered, with an 
 affability that was slightly confused by the 
 abruptness of the address, that he could not 
 possibly have the least objection. It was 
 obvious that the yellow-ochre gentleman was a 
 member of the club, though Gerald had never 
 seen him there before. Neither, it would seem, 
 had any other of the occupants of the dining-
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR 35 
 
 room, for Gerald could notice, Avith his quick 
 j ournalistic capacity for noticing everything that 
 was going on around him, how the talk at the 
 tables had dropped into a whispering buzz 
 of wonder, and how the diplomatic steward 
 glanced from table to table discreetly 
 answering softly propounded questions. 
 
 The stranger had planted himself squarely 
 at the table opposite to Gerald and was pro- 
 ceeding to shovel soup into his mouth with a 
 rapidity and noisy satisfaction in the process 
 that amused Gerald. The moment the soup 
 had vanished the stranger began again. 
 
 'Not at all bad soup that, eh, stranger? 
 I've lapped up worse stuff than that in my 
 time and been thankful too.' 
 
 Gerald was amused and interested. A 
 more irritable or a more fastidious man might 
 have been annoyed by the familiar volubility 
 and demonstrative eating powers of the 
 
 D 2
 
 36 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 stranger, but Gerald was always eager in his 
 capacity of journalist to study types of any 
 kind, and this type seemed sufficiently re- 
 markable. 
 
 So he answered with a friendly smile that 
 lie thought the food at the Voyagers' was 
 ])retty good, and having so far ingratiated 
 himself with his companion he artfully pro- 
 ceeded to sound him by asking him if he did 
 not think it was generally satisfactory. 
 
 The stranger had, by this time, despatched 
 with amazing swiftness a large plate of salmon, 
 and to the utter discomfiture of the solemn 
 waiter, had handed him the empty plate with 
 the order to ' bring some more of that.' The 
 waiter staggered in helpless indignation over 
 to the diplomatic steward. The diplomatic 
 steward apparently allowed the eccentric 
 demand to pass unchallenged, for a second 
 portion of fish was placed before the stranger.
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR yj 
 
 who, in the interval, had packed his large 
 mouth almost as full as it could hold with 
 bread, and proceeded to address Gerald 
 through that medium. 
 
 ' Why, the fact is, stranger, that this is the 
 very first time I've ever waltzed into this 
 shanty. Fact, sir.' 
 
 By this time the bread had disappeared 
 find in its place the stranger was packing 
 away large portions of salmon, without ever 
 allowing the packing process to interfere at 
 all with the current of his conversation. 
 
 'What's more curious, too, it's the first 
 time that ever I have been in this ble^^sed 
 little island of yourn. I only landed at 
 Liverpool this morning.' 
 
 Gerald allowed his curiosity to get the 
 better of his politeness. Besides, he saw from 
 the free-and-easy manner of the stranger that 
 he was not a man who would readily take
 
 58 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 offence at any little departure from the 
 ordinary rules of social etiquette. 
 
 So Gerald, with the gracious manner 
 which he assumed whenever it fell to his lot 
 to interview some great statesman for the 
 columns of the ' Catapult,' inquired of the 
 stranger how it happened that he had come 
 to belong to the Voyagers, and why he had 
 made his appearance within its walls on the 
 evening of his first arrival in London. 
 
 ' Waal, now, that's mighty curious, too,' 
 the stranger answered, not in the least annoyed 
 or embarrassed by Gerald's questions. ' Why, 
 you see, it came about in this way. It was 
 over there on the Veldt, on the eternalest, 
 tarnationest, derndest hot day it was ever my 
 luck to strike.' 
 
 Gerald wondered where the Veldt was, but 
 the many-coloured stranger seemed to assume 
 that his listener knew all about that, for he
 
 THE MAA FROM AFAR 39 
 
 went on talking and eating very quickly. 
 Though he generally asked for a second 
 helping of everything that was offered to him, 
 he consumed his food with such rapidity that 
 he had already caught up with Gerald, who 
 was just eating an anchovy on toast. 
 
 'Whew! but it was hot though. Even 
 Xoah didn't like it, though he could stand 
 heat pretty well. There always was a bit of 
 blazes about Xoah.' 
 
 This was interpolated in a confidential 
 way to Gerald, as if Gerald was familiar with 
 Xoah, but not so familiar as to be unwilling 
 to hear an independent opinion upon him. 
 The name, however, only conjured up ia 
 Gerald's mind a childish memory of a wooden 
 little gentleman in a blue gown and a brown 
 hat, whose children and whose wives had all 
 an amazing resemblance to each other. So 
 he simply nodded, and the stranger went on.
 
 40 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 'Yes, sir, it was hot, I tell you. Fact. 
 So I just happened into the tent for a little 
 shade, and sothin' ccolin'.' 
 
 Here the stranger emptied at a draught a 
 tall tumbler of whisky and soda which he 
 had commanded, and signified to the waiter 
 with a wink to bring him another. 
 
 ' Where was I ? ' he asked, after wiping his 
 lips with an enormous red handkerchief. 
 
 'In the tent in the shade,' Gerald prompted, 
 politely. 
 
 ' Why, yes, of course, after drinkin' sothin' 
 coolin'. Well, I just set down, feeling quite 
 kam and pleas'nt, just in the mood for a little 
 liorht Htteratoor : but there wasn't much 
 litteratoor knocking about on the Veldt, you 
 bet.' 
 
 Gerald smiled a smile of grave ^sympathy 
 with the deficiencies of the Yeldt. 
 
 ' Well, the only thing I could find to read
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR 41 
 
 was a number of the " Daily Xews " that had 
 come up country round some tea. It was two 
 months old, but that wasn't bad for the Veldt. 
 Well, sir, the first thing that caught my eye 
 in that journal was a paragraph about the 
 Voyagers' Club that was about to be started 
 in London. Then I says to myself, " Seth, old 
 pard, you've done a good bit of voyaging in 
 your time, so that's all right." Then I says to 
 myself, " Seth, old pard, it's a good deal more 
 nor likely that you'll be waltzing over to Lon- 
 don one of these days. So that's all right." 
 Then I says to myself, " Seth, old pard, when 
 you're in London it would be quite the high- 
 toned thing for you to belong to a real club, 
 all smart fixin's." So I just wrote off a letter 
 to the sharp as was booming the show, a sharp 
 with the name of a bird.' 
 
 ' Eaven ? ' suggested Gerald. 
 
 ' Eight you are, stranger ; got it first time,
 
 42 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 Kaven it was. Waal now, when I seed that . 
 name it set me thinking.' 
 
 The stranger looked so intently into Gerald's 
 face as he said this that Gerald was forced out 
 of ordinary politeness to inquire, ' Why ? ' 
 
 • Why ! Because we had a chum in camp 
 with just such a name, though it wasn't the 
 name he went by among the boys. We al- 
 ways called him " Gentleman Jim " we did, 
 poor boy ! ' 
 
 The stranger sighed and dropped into si- 
 lence for a few moments. 
 
 ' Why poor boy ? ' Gerald asked, in order 
 to show some interest. 
 
 ' He was murdered lately — poor old Jim — 
 Gentleman Jim ! ' 
 
 The melancholy recollection which had in- 
 duced the stranger to interrupt his narrative 
 soon passed off. He took a deep drink and 
 resumed.
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR 43 
 
 ' Waal, I went to Gentleman Jim and I 
 showed him that bit of the newspaper.' 
 
 ' *' Air you two birds of the same feather 
 anyhow ? " says I. And he looked up and 
 laughed and said, "Why, bless you, man, 
 that's my brother ! " 
 
 ' Then says I, •' Perhaps you wouldn't mind 
 giving me a line to him," and I explained my 
 notions about beloncrincr to a hicrh-toned club. 
 
 ' Then he laucrhed acrain and said that he 
 and his brother weren't particularly good pals 
 — but he did give me the letter after a bit, and 
 I sent it along to old man Raven on this side 
 with a note of my own, allowing as I had been 
 a pretty slick voyager in my time and could 
 figure in along with the smartest child in his 
 record.' 
 
 Gerald could hardly restrain a smile as he 
 thought of the amused face of Captain Jack- 
 daw when he read this strange epistle. But
 
 44 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 he did restrain it, or rather converted it into 
 a look of still more absorbing interest in the 
 traveller's tale, and the traveller went on. 
 
 'Waal, time went on, and time went on, 
 and the Yeldt went on, and the diamonds 
 went on, which was the best of all. Times 
 were, it seemed to me, as if there was a big 
 blazing diamond for every drop of water in 
 the Yeldt. But one day, when I had clean 
 forgotten all about it, there came a letter to 
 me addressed all right to Seth Chickering, 
 Esquire, Oomjanstrek, Blumenveldt, South 
 Africa. It was from Mr. John Eaven, send- 
 ing his kind regards to his brother, and 
 telling me, in more high-toned language than 
 I can tell you, that I had been duly elected a 
 member of the Voyagers' Club, and would I 
 be good enough to forward a cheque for my 
 subscription. Well, I was good enough. 
 Seth Chickering could write as many cheques
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR 45 
 
 as he liked, I guess, for more stiffish figures 
 nor that and never notice. Eh ? ' 
 
 This last ejaculation was fired at Gerald 
 in an interrogative way, with a faint suspi- 
 cion of defiance in it. So Gerald hastened to 
 answer, 'Xo doubt, of course,' with all the 
 sincerity possible. The man in yellow ochre 
 seemed mollified, and went on. 
 
 ' You bet I felt good that day. Member 
 of a high-toned London club ! I guess my 
 head was a bit too big for me that day, for 
 Noah and I had words, and we came to 
 blows pretty near, which would have been 
 bad for Xoah.' 
 
 Gerald glanced at the great red hands as 
 they lay on the table with the great white 
 diamond blazing, and thought that very 
 possibly it might have been bad for Xoah if 
 he had got into any physical controversy 
 with Mr. Seth Chickering.
 
 46 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 ' Waal,' Mr. Chickering went on, ' time 
 came and time went, and a pretty good time it 
 was, considering everything. Wliy, when I 
 was a bit of a boy and used to read fairy tales 
 and such like, with their talk of jewels and pre- 
 cious stones and such like, I didn't think there 
 were so many diamonds in the world as just 
 came rolling into our hands there on the Yeldt. 
 And we weren't the only ones neither. But we 
 were the luckiest, and by a long way too ; I will 
 say that. Say, now, what do you think of 
 that?' 
 
 Mr. Chickering dipped his hand into a 
 hip-pocket of his yellow-ochre trousers and 
 produced a small canvas bag tied with a 
 piece of string. He slowly unfastened the 
 string, and then, turning the mouth of the bag 
 downwards, shook its contents carefully out 
 on to the white tablecloth. A little flood of 
 diamonds ran out of the bag and settled like
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR 47 
 
 a glittering, glowing pool of silver fire upon 
 the white tablecloth. 
 
 Gerald could not avoid giving a cry of 
 surprise, for the stones were unusually large 
 and very splendid in colour and water, and 
 they gleamed and winked in a fascinating, 
 opulent way as they lay on the cloth. 
 
 LIr. Chickering leaned back in his chair 
 and enjoyed largely Gerald's looks of admira- 
 tion and surprise. 
 
 ' Pretty sparklers, ain't they ? ' he inquired, 
 with a beaming smile all over his red-brick 
 countenance. ' Don't see them sort of things 
 lying around promiscuous on a club table 
 every day, eh, pard ? ' 
 
 Gerald admitted to himself and to the big 
 man that he did not. Gerald knew" little 
 about the value of precious stones — his journ- 
 alistic omniscience was not often tested in that 
 way — but he could not help thinking that if
 
 48 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 they were real, as there seemed no reason to 
 doubt that they were, he had never seen the 
 equivalent of so much money so lightly treated 
 before. 
 
 ' They are very beautiful,' he said. 
 
 ' Beautiful ! I should think they were,' 
 the big man answered. ' But they're not the 
 most beautiful I've seen or handled, not by a 
 long chalk. What do you say to these ? ' and 
 he drew from another pocket another little 
 canvas bag. Untying the string he shook 
 another little pile of diamonds on to the table- 
 cloth at a little distance from the first pile. 
 
 ' Them's more beautiful,' he said. 
 
 So they were, undoubtedly ; larger, finer, 
 more brilliant. They looked exceedingly 
 pretty as they gleamed and sparkled on the 
 white tablecloth, and the big man seemed to 
 take an almost childish dehglit in their glitter, 
 for he pushed them about with his big red
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR 49 
 
 forefinger, and smoothed them out with his 
 big red palm, and appeared to be as pleased 
 as a child with a new toy, in noticing how 
 they caught the hght and flashed prismatic- 
 ally. 
 
 Gerald glanced around uneasily. There 
 was something reckless in the way in which 
 the stranger scattered his diamonds about the 
 table, which made him feel nervous. He felt 
 sure that everybody else must be looking at 
 them, and he was reassured to find that the 
 room had nearly emptied and that most of 
 the diners had gone away. Xear the screen 
 that led into the regions of the kitchen some 
 of the waiters were gathered together, 
 glancing at the table where he sat, and whis- 
 pering discreetly together. Undoubtedly the 
 big man made himself an object of remark, 
 but Gerald hoped that they had not noticed 
 the diamonds. 
 
 VOL. I. E
 
 50 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 The stranger meanwhile seemed only to 
 enjoy the effect that his display of diamonds 
 had produced upon Gerald. 
 
 ' I tell you, pard,' he said, confidentially 
 leaning across the table and speaking with all 
 the solemn gravity natural to a man who had 
 just drunk four whiskies and a soda, 'I tell 
 you, pard, there's a strange story to do with 
 those diamonds. Fact ! ' 
 
 He gazed at Gerald with a kind of alcoholic 
 intensity as if he expected Gerald immediately 
 to express a desire for the whole history of 
 the diamonds. If he had any such expecta- 
 tions they were disappointed, for Gerald said 
 nothing. He was wondering to himself who 
 on earth this extraordinary man could be. 
 
 The extraordinary man seemed determined 
 to pour the history of his diamonds into 
 Gerald's ears. 
 
 ' Tell you what, pard, I'll tell you all about
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR 51 
 
 those diamonds. I like you. You're a white 
 man, you are, and when Seth Chickering says 
 a man's a white man, you may bet your boot 
 soles he ain't no doggoned nigger. Xo, sir.' 
 
 Gerald wondered vaguely how far Mr. 
 Seth Chickering's emphatic commendation 
 would approve him in the eyes of the world 
 at large, and of, say, the editor of the 'Catapult " 
 in particular. Indeed, just then Mr. Seth 
 Chickering did not seem to be quite the man 
 whose certificate of character would carry any 
 great weight with it. His face glowed redder 
 than ever, his big eyes were staring at Gerald 
 with a slightly alcoholic enthusiasm, and his 
 manner and gestures were, to say the least of 
 it, peculiar. However, Gi-erald endeavoured 
 to force his countenance into an expression of 
 gratitude at Mr. Chickering's approval. 
 
 ' Yes, siree,' Mr. Chickering repeated, 
 emphatically, ' you are a white man, that's 
 
 i)3 
 
 tiSlTV OF ILUNOIS
 
 52 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 what you are. A white man ; and you shall 
 hear all about the diamonds.' 
 
 Gerald began, from the mere force of 
 repetition, to feel a certain interest in the 
 threatened story about the diamonds. Indeed, 
 it would be difficult not to feel strong emotions 
 of some sort about this wild man, who 
 scattered precious stones in such profusion 
 over the dining-table of a London club. 
 
 ' Hadn't you better take those up ? ' Gerald 
 suggested, pointing to the shining stones. 
 * Some of them might get lost, you know.' 
 
 Mr. Chickering raked them together with 
 his big red hands as if they had been pebbles, 
 and shovelled them into their little bag 
 again. 
 
 ' Plenty more where they come from. 
 Them's only specimens. Just you listen and 
 ril tell you all about them.' 
 
 Gerald glanced at his watch. It was not
 
 THE MAN FROM AFAR 53 
 
 quite ten — still a long time before he need 
 think of going to his festivity. 
 
 ' Very well/ he said. ' I shall be delighted 
 to hear the story of the diamonds. But 
 suppose we have it outside, where we can 
 smoke.' 
 
 Mr. Chickering nodded approval. 
 
 ' Right you are, pard. I can always talk 
 better when I have tobacco between my teeth. 
 Where's your derned smoking-room .^ ' 
 
 He drained his glass as he spoke, and 
 weighing on the table with his big red hands 
 lifted himself into a standing position. Gerald 
 rose also and led the way. 
 
 The regular smoking-room of the club was 
 downstairs, but there was a small room, a 
 kind of alcove, on the landing between the 
 ground floor and the first floor on which the 
 dining-room was, where members could 
 also smoke, and this little alcove was a
 
 54 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 favourite resort of Gerald's. So he piloted 
 his new friend thither, planted him upon the 
 comfortable sofa which ran all round it as in an 
 eastern divan, ordered coffee and liqueurs, and 
 seating himself by Mr. Chickering's side, 
 asked him what he would smoke. 
 
 Mr. Chickering said he would take what 
 he called a cii?areet. Gerald offered him his 
 case, took one himself, and leaned back 
 waiting till Mr. Chickering had lit up and 
 was ready to begin his narrative. This was 
 not long. Mr. Chickering took a considerable 
 quantity of smoke into his lungs, allowed it to 
 roll forth again in steady volumes through 
 his nostrils, gave a sigh of satisfaction, and 
 began his story.
 
 55 
 
 CHAPTEE m 
 
 A STRA^'GE STOEY 
 
 ' You liked those diamonds ? ' 
 
 Gerald nodded. 
 
 ' Shows your taste, young man, shows 
 your taste. But we can do better than 
 that, you bet, on the Yeldt. Just look here.' 
 
 The stranger thrust a red finger and 
 thumb into a yellow-ochre waistcoat pocket, 
 and fished out something which he placed 
 upon the little table where the coffee-cups 
 stood. 
 
 The something was a large diamond, one 
 of the largest Gerald had ever seen. It was 
 as large round as a shiUing, and it glittered 
 with strange fires.
 
 56 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 Gerald gave an involuntary cry of 
 surprise. ' What a splendid stone ! ' he 
 said. 
 
 ' I believe you, pard,' said Mr. Chicker- 
 ing, leaning back on the sofa and enjoying 
 the wonder of his companion. ' That's a 
 dandy stone, that is, and no mistake about it. 
 But that's not our boss stone nohow. We 
 can go better than that at the Yeldt yonder,' 
 and Mr. Chickering made a slight backward 
 motion with his head as if the Yeldt were 
 somewhere in the immediate vicinity of St. 
 James's Square — say somewhere up in Jermyn 
 Street. 
 
 Gerald took the stone in his hands. He 
 was no skilled lapidary, but it needed no 
 skilled lapidary to tell at a glance that such a 
 diamond was exceptionally beautiful and ex- 
 ceptionally valuable. 
 
 ' If you have many more diamonds like
 
 A STRANGE STORY 57 
 
 that,' he said, with a smile, ' you must be a 
 tolerably rich man." 
 
 Mr. Chickering leaned back on the sofa 
 and laughed heartily. ' Waal, yes,' he said ; 
 'I reckon I'm pretty comfortably off. Oh, 
 there's quite enough to go round up there ' — 
 here he again jerked bis head in the direction 
 of St. James's Square and the Yeldt — ^ there 
 would be plenty enough to go round if there 
 had been more of us standing in than there 
 were. That mine didn't peter out in a hurry, 
 I reckon.' 
 
 Gerald handed him back the diamond, 
 which, while he had been talking, he had 
 kept in the hollow of his hand, admiring its 
 weight and its beauty, and thinking of the 
 enormous difference that the possession of a 
 few stones hke that made to a man. ' If I had 
 only a handful of stones hke that,' he thought 
 to himself, 'it might be good-bye
 
 58 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 " Catapult," and Hey Westward Ho ! for a 
 journey round the world.' 
 
 But if he thought this, all he said was, as 
 he dropped the shining stone back into Mr. 
 Chickering's red palm : 
 
 ' You and your friends must be very 
 lucky.' 
 
 ' That's as it may be,' was Mr. Chickering's 
 laconic remark. 
 
 Then they were both silent for a while, 
 puffing away at their cigarettes. Gerald was 
 meditating upon the curious chance which 
 made his yellow-ochre friend a millionaire, 
 while he, Gerald, who could spend money 
 with so much enjoyment to himself, was the 
 bondslave of the ' Catapult ' for six guineas 
 a week. That very morning Gerald had 
 thought himself a very lucky and very well- 
 paid young man, as, indeed, he was, and he 
 really was very fond of the 'Catapult.' But
 
 A STRANGE STORY 59 
 
 the sight of that glittering image of wealth 
 in the red fist of the stranger had troubled 
 him. 
 
 The sound of Mr. Chickering's voice 
 startled Gerald from his brown study. 
 
 ' The funny part of it is that some of them 
 don't know their luck.' 
 
 ' Some of your friends don't know their 
 luck ? ' 
 
 Gerald was beginning to get quite in- 
 terested in Mr. Chickering and his unknown 
 friends. 
 
 ' Waal, they ain't my friends yet, but they 
 will be, I reckon, when they find out what 
 I've got to say to them. It isn't every day 
 that a man turns up from South Africa and 
 says, " Here's a small fortune in diamonds for 
 you." Is it now ? ' 
 
 Thus appealed to, Gerald was compelled to 
 admit that the event was not diurnal. In fact,
 
 6o RED DIAMONDS 
 
 up to now, it had not happened to him at all. 
 He wished it would. 
 
 At this pleasantry Mr. Chickering laughed 
 heartily. He surveyed Gerald good- 
 humour edly. 
 
 ' I wish it did for your sake,' he said, ' for 
 I've taken quite a fancy to you, pard. Who 
 knows if I shall take a fancy to the others 
 when I find them ? ' 
 
 ' When you find them P Do you mean 
 that you have got to look for them ? ' 
 
 ' Hit it, stranger, first go off. That's 
 exactly what I do mean. Seth Chickering 
 has got to cavort around until he claps hands 
 upon certain people whom he has never heard 
 of until a year ago and never seen in all his 
 life. How's that for high, eh ? ' 
 
 Gerald thought it very high indeed ; too 
 high for his comprehension. Mr. Chickering 
 condescended to explain. He had mellowed
 
 A STRANGE STORY 6i 
 
 to a narrative point and Gerald was sufficiently 
 interested to be very willing to sit there and 
 listen to him 
 
 ' You see,' he said, ' it's this way. Sup- 
 pose you imagine that certain gentlemen get 
 together and say to themselves among them- 
 selves, " You and me'U go pards and play the 
 square game and share and share alike." 
 Suppose that now.' 
 
 Mr. Chickering glanced appealingly at 
 Gerald as he put this proposition forward. 
 Gerald nodded in token that he was quite 
 willing to suppose so much. 
 
 ' Very well,' Mr. Chickering went on, 
 evidently flattered by this proof of his 
 listenei''s readiness ; ' very well. Suppose 
 further that some of these pards say to others 
 of these pards, "Pdght you are, old man," every 
 tiaie.' 
 
 Mr. Chickering paused, as a man might
 
 62 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 pause wlio had announced to his audience 
 some soul-stirring, some world-startling truth. 
 Gerald was neither stirred nor startled, but 
 he did not wish to seem indifferent, so he 
 simply nodded and said ' Of course.' 
 
 ' And, of course it is,' said Mi\ Chickering, 
 cheerily. ' Some of these pards say to others 
 of these pards : " Look ahere, mister, we don't 
 care one derned red cent for what we snakes 
 out of this here lode. But there are those in 
 the world as we do care for a derned deal 
 more than our derned old selves, and so 
 suppose as how we fixes it this away," and 
 it was fixed that away.' 
 
 ' What away ? ' said Gerald, unconsciously 
 falling into the phraseology of his new friend 
 as that new friend paused in his talk. 
 
 ' Why this way,' answered Mr. Chickering. 
 
 ' Says pard number one, " Money ain't so 
 much account to me^" savs he, " but there's a
 
 A STRANGE STORY 63 
 
 little girl away in London thousands and 
 thousands of miles from here who might find 
 that money sweeten her young life. It's for 
 her I hope to get rich," says pard number 
 one.' 
 
 ' And very creditable of him too,' mur- 
 mured Gerald, for Mr. Chickering had paused, 
 and the expression of his fiery face seemed 
 to betoken that he thoua:ht Gerald ouaht to 
 say something. 
 
 ' You are right, stranger, right as can be,' 
 he went on cheerily after Gerald's observation. 
 ' Pard number one was a white man, he was. 
 Poor old pard ! Then up gets pard number 
 two — and what does pard number two say ? 
 Why pard number two says, '* Waal, money 
 ain't much account to me neither, if it comes 
 to that, though it was a darned deal too 
 much to me once," says he. " But I have 
 a boy over there in London all those thou-
 
 64 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 sands of miles away," says he, " and I should 
 like him to have money," says pard number 
 two.' 
 
 Again Mr. Chickering paused ; again 
 Gerald murmured something complimentary 
 to the character of pard number two ; again 
 Mr. Chickering resumed his narrative. 
 
 ' Then pard number three waltzed in. That 
 was Noah, that was — Noah Bland.' 
 
 ' " Waal," says Noah Bland, " I guess I ain't 
 a goin' to go the high-toned with any bluff 
 about not carin' for money, for I do " — and he 
 did too, the cuss — " but I've a kid over in 
 London too," says he, " if it comes to that, and 
 I'll go bail he cares about money, if he takes 
 after his father at all." And between you and 
 me,' stranger, if he does take after his father he 
 must be a daisy, that's all. He was a bad 
 man from way back was Noah Bland.' 
 
 Gerald was beginning to feel faintly drowsy.
 
 A STRANGE STORY 65 
 
 The rolling tones of the stranger's voice seemed 
 to flow over him with a soothing effect and 
 he began to close his eyes involuntarily. But 
 there was something emphatic in the tone in 
 which Mr. Chickerincr condemned Xoah Bland 
 that brought him to liimself again with a start. 
 
 ' Yes, sir, Xoah Bland was an out-and-out 
 tarnation scoundrel, that's what he was. Pei'- 
 haps you will be wondering why we liad 
 anything to do with him then? ' 
 
 And Mr. Chickering gave Gerald an interro- 
 gative stare. 
 
 Gerald admitted that the question was 
 pertinent to his thoughts. 
 
 ' Why did we have anything to do with 
 him?' said Mr. Chickering. 'Why, because 
 we couldn't help it, that's why. Twas he as 
 had the notion first about that claim ; but as he 
 hadn't nary cent to work it with, why he came 
 to us five chums J 
 
 VOL. I. r
 
 66 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 ' Oh, there were five of you,' said Gerald, 
 seeing that Mr. Chickering expected him to say 
 something. 
 
 ' Why, of course there were. One of them 
 was Gentleman Jim, what I told you of. The 
 other was — but it don't matter about him. He 
 was a pal of Gentleman Jim's, but he got up 
 and gitted before we struck ile as it were. 
 Gentleman Jim put his brother's name into 
 the " biz." and his pal put a sister, and so there 
 we all were, you see, fixed up fair and square 
 and comfortable.' 
 
 Gerald filled up the pause which followed 
 each of Mr. Chickering's deliveries by trying 
 to sketch for himself a fancy portrait of Mr. 
 Noah Bland. But the attempt was not satis- 
 factory, and before it could be completed Mr. 
 Chickering was under way again. 
 
 'Waal,' he went on in a rambling way, 
 vrith a voice in which repeated libations had
 
 A STRANGE STORY 67 
 
 developed an alarming tendency to vagueness, 
 ' to make a long story short, we settled it this 
 away.' 
 
 It was evident that Ish. Chickering's 
 mental process had outstripped the vocal 
 process, and that the narrative he was now 
 relating to Gerald was but the sequel to a 
 lengthier narrative which had flashed through 
 his excited brain, but which had found no 
 verbal form. 
 
 ' We agreed to stand in together, each for 
 each, and all for all, like one of them derned 
 Tontine rig- outs you may have heerd tell on. 
 Life's pretty cheap out there on the Yeldt, 
 what Avith the fever and the niggers and the 
 fire-water and a general casualness in the 
 shootin'-iron line, and when a man gets out of 
 his blanket in the morning he dursn't bet his 
 pile that hell roll into it again at night. Xo, 
 sir.' 
 
 F 2
 
 68 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 Mr. Chickering sighed deeply as he uttered 
 this axiom. It occurred to Gerald that it 
 had a certain applicability to other places 
 besides the Yeldt, but he held his tongue, 
 for he began to feel as if he had had enough 
 of Mr. Chickering's story and he feared that 
 interruptions might delay its conclusion. 
 
 ' Waal,' resumed Mr. Chickering, ' we 
 fixed it up that we was all to share ekally in 
 the mine, and ef any one of us dropped out, 
 as might happen, ye know, pard, any day, 
 we'd all stand in ekal for his share, too, unless 
 he happened to have kith or kin to whom he 
 wished that it should go. I ain't got no child 
 myself, for the very good reason that I never 
 got married, nor no relatives I know of ; but 
 t'other pards, they had children or relatives, 
 every man jack of 'em — this one a boy and 
 that one a girl, and this one a brother 
 and that one a sister, and Noah Bland
 
 A STRANGE STORY 69 
 
 had his beauty — for a beauty he must be if 
 he takes after old man Xoah, for sartaiu 
 sure.' 
 
 There was another pause, during which 
 Mr. Chickering, after draining his tumbler, 
 gazed moodily at the floor, apparently 
 engaged in conjuring up past scenes of Veldt 
 life. It was obvious that the story which he 
 was telling to Aspen was going on in his mind 
 all the time that he was silent, and that when 
 he spoke he took up the thread not at the 
 point where he had audibly left oJS", but at the 
 moment to which his somewhat confused 
 meditations had carried him. He sighed 
 heavily now, and fixing a somewhat bloodshot 
 eye upon Gerald he said : 
 
 ' Waal, we must all peter out sooner or 
 later, but I was mighty sorry for those two 
 sharps, you bet. Now ef it had been Xoah I 
 shouldn't have cared a dern, but it warn't
 
 70 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 Noah, nohow. It was all Noah's doing — darn 
 him ! ' 
 
 ' Was it indeed ? ' Gerald asked. He 
 found the thread of the narrative difficult 
 to follow, but he wished to please Mr. 
 Chickering by manifesting an intelligent in- 
 terest. 
 
 ' Yes, sir. At least I believe so. Why it 
 was he, the skunk, as got up the fight between 
 old Warbler and Gentleman Jim's pal, which 
 did for poor old Warbler. That's why Jim's 
 pal left us, you know. He thought it might 
 be onpleasant for us, having him there. 
 Though it was as fair a fight as ever I seed — 
 and I've seen a few, you bet.' 
 
 ' And what became of Noah ? ' Gerald 
 questioned, for he saw that Mr. Chickering was 
 wandering in the meadows of memory again. 
 
 ' Ay, ay,' said Mr. Chickering, ' to be sure. 
 Why they hanged him, of course.'
 
 A STRANGE STORY 71 
 
 ' Did they ? ' asked Gerald, in some 
 astonishment at this sudden and tragic conclu- 
 sion to a career in which he had been interest- 
 ing himself. ' Who did ? ' 
 
 ' Why the boys in camp, for sure. There 
 was no mistake about it ; he dropped poor 
 Gentleman Jim. Even if it warn't good 
 enough that the Chinaman saw him do it, the 
 bullet fitted his pistol, and there wasn't another 
 man in camp had a pistol like Noah's. Shot 
 him from behind, like the derned coward he 
 was. So they strung him up after a fair trial 
 before Judge Lynch, and serve him right too, 
 for I believe he poisoned the other sharp, and 
 he'd have killed me too, if he'd had time 
 enough.' 
 
 ' Why should he ? ' asked Gerald. 
 
 ' Why should he ? Why, because he 
 wanted all the claim to himself, the selfish 
 thief.'
 
 72 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 ' Nice man, Noah Bland,' Gerald murmured. 
 
 ' Nice ! He was a daisy, he was — -just a 
 daisy. Why I've seen some pretty tall scoun- 
 drels in my time, in 'Frisco and elsewhere, but 
 for an out-and-out thoroughgoing scoundrel, 
 commend me to Noah Bland. But he died 
 game enough. He asked for time to write a 
 letter after the court sentenced him, and he 
 gave it to one of the jury to post, as coolly as 
 you please, and then they turned him off.' 
 
 ' What a strange story ! ' Gerald observed. 
 It certainly seemed a grim story of blood and 
 treasure, and crime and lawless law. A httle 
 confused, perhaps, but that was owing to Mr. 
 Chickering's way of telling his tale. 
 
 ' After that,' said Mr. Chickering, ' I shut 
 up shop. The claim was about petered out, 
 but I sold it for a fancy figure. We'd got 
 all our diamonds safely stored at the Govern- 
 ment Bank in Cape Town, and a pretty for-
 
 A STRANGE STORY 73 
 
 tune they made. And so, being alone in the 
 world as it were, I allowed that the best thing 
 I could do was just to come across to England 
 and look after the rightful heirs. I guess 
 they'll think they're lucky sharps when I find 
 them out and tell 'em the piece of news I've 
 got for *em. And we've got it all fixed up in 
 a lawyer's deed, and the money is to be shared 
 out on next New Year's.' 
 
 ' The first of January next ? ' 
 
 ' Eight you are. We call it New Year's.' 
 
 Gerald felt dimly conscious that one of the 
 ' sharps ' must be Captain Jackdaw. He was 
 about to say so when Mr. Chickering rose with 
 a sigh. 
 
 It was not surprising that thoughts of such 
 a past should arouse Mr. Chickering's regrets, 
 and Mr. Chickering himself was evidently bhss- 
 fully unaware that there were any gaps in his 
 narrative.
 
 74 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 ' Waal,' he said, ' the best of friends must 
 part, whether on the Yeldt yonder or here in 
 Babylon, and I guess it's time to say good- 
 night, young gentleman.' 
 
 He held out his great red hand, on which 
 the big white diamond blazed, and Gerald, 
 rising, extended his own to meet it, when sud- 
 denly Mr. Chickering withdrew his proffered 
 hand in order to thrust it into his breast-coat 
 pocket. 
 
 ' Young man,' he said, with a gravity which 
 a determined intention to master the insidious 
 slothfulness of his drinks made most porten- 
 tous, ' young man, I like you ; and when Seth 
 Chickering says he likes a man he means it, 
 you bet, the whole way and a bit beyond too, 
 mebbe. And where I like a man I trust him, 
 and I'm a-going to trust you. Will you do 
 me a favour, pard ? ' 
 
 Gerald looked at him in wonder. What
 
 A STRANGE STORY 75 
 
 on earth was coming ? For a moment 
 the unworthy idea of a demand for a small 
 loan flitted across his mind to be imme- 
 diately rejected. Mr. Chickering eyed him 
 inquiringly. 
 
 ' Why, of course,' Gerald stammered. ' I 
 shall be dehghted to be of any service to you 
 — a strancrer in a strancfe land.' 
 
 'That's bully,' Mr. Chickering replied, 
 evidently much encouraged by Gerald's 
 answer, and withdrawing his hand from his 
 breast-pocket he displayed to Gerald's gaze 
 a very fat brown leather pocket-book, 
 fastened with a clasp and girt with a strong 
 band. 
 
 'D'ye see that there wallet, mister?' said 
 Mr. Chickering. 
 
 Gerald nodded. 
 
 ' Waal, I want you to take charge of that 
 there wallet for me till to-morrow. It's a
 
 76 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 derned sight too precious for me to risk losing 
 it, and I know I'm a bit keerless like when 
 I've had a drink or two, and I've had a drink 
 or two to-night I don't deny ; also this yer 
 city's new to me, and I propose to take 
 rxAtoX^ a little pascar round about and see what the 
 
 saloons are like and the girls, and the fixin's 
 
 generally, and it might be jest as well not to 
 hev that there wallet on board. So, if you 
 don't mind, pard, will you jest take charge of 
 it till to-morrow when I ask you for it ? 
 You happen in here most every day, I 
 guess ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, I do come here every day,' Gerald 
 answered, ' and, of course, if you wish it 
 I will accept your charge ; but isn't there 
 somebody else — the landlord of your hotel, 
 
 the steward of the club ? ' 
 
 Mr. Chickering shook his head decidedly. 
 ' No, sir,' he said, decisively. ' You're the
 
 A STRANGE STORY 77 
 
 man I kin trust, I see that in yer eye. So 
 there you are, my young friend.' 
 
 And Mr. Chickering thrust the pocket- 
 book into Gerald's hesitating fingers. 
 
 Gerald looked at him dubiously. 
 
 ' Would you like me to go out with you ? ' 
 he asked. ' I've got an engagement at eleven, 
 but up to then ' 
 
 Mr. Chickering waved the offer genially 
 away. 
 
 ' Not at all, pard ; not at all — thanks to 
 you all the same. But I like to knock about a 
 new town, and I like to do it by myself. I've 
 knocked about by myself all my hfe, and I 
 ain't tired of it yet. Xo, sir ! But you're a 
 white man, you are, and we'll hev a good 
 time one of these fine days.' 
 
 He crushed Gerald's right hand in an 
 iron grip, and moved heavily away, leaving 
 Gerald speechless with surprise on the divan,
 
 78 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 holding the pocket-book in his left hand, and 
 gazing after the retreating figure. Mr. 
 Chickering lumbered down the stairs into the 
 hall, a strange yellow-ochre colossus, ex- 
 tracted an enormous stick from the stand and 
 passed out through the glass doors into the 
 night, while a group of attendants clustered 
 together to gaze wonderingly after the un- 
 wonted apparition. 
 
 ' I wonder,' said Gerald to himself, ' if I 
 ought to accept this trust. I wonder if I 
 ought to let him go about by himself.' 
 
 He got up and stood for a moment reflec- 
 tively at the head of the stairs. 
 
 ' He has been drinking a lot,' Gerald 
 mused ; ' but he seems to be used to that, 
 and to be used to looking after himself in 
 wilder parts of the world even than London 
 at night — though that is wild enough, heaven 
 knows.'
 
 A STRANGE STORY 79 
 
 Gerald had the true journalist's respect 
 for London, which he believed to be the 
 premier city in all things. 
 
 Still he felt vaguely uneasy. He thrust 
 the pocket-book into his breast-pocket and 
 ran down the stairs with a half-formed inten- 
 tion of pursuing Mr. Chickering and getting 
 some more definite information — about what, 
 he scarcely knew — from him. He shpped on 
 his coat and passed out into the square. It 
 was a starless night, but it was not obscure ; 
 it was what sailors call a clear, dark night. 
 Gerald stood on the steps of the club. 
 Hansoms were darting hither and thither, 
 their lamps gleaming like the eyes of strange 
 monsters in some mysterious jungle. There 
 were not many passers-by, but those there 
 were had none of them the mighty build of 
 Mr. Chickering. Gerald walked a few paces 
 rapidly to the left, and then retracing his
 
 So RED DIAMONDS 
 
 steps walked a few paces rapidly to the right. 
 But his efforts were vain. Short as the time 
 had been in which he had waited, hesitating 
 in the alcove, it was long enough to allow 
 Mr. Chickering to get out of sight. The 
 stranger had disappeared into the vastness of 
 London.
 
 8i 
 
 CHAPTER lY 
 
 IX THE DOORWAY 
 
 As Gerald stood at tlie club door a carriage 
 drove up and stopped. The carriage door 
 opened and a man got out. Gerald knew the 
 man at once. He was Captain Eaven. He 
 stood for some moments at the open carriage 
 door talking to the ladies, its occupants. 
 They were, as Gerald could see distinctly, 
 ladies — two ladies. One, the one nearest to 
 the door, was very young and very pretty. 
 Gerald crot a kind of bewildering delightful 
 impression of a delicate oval face, of a pair 
 of bright eyes, of a mass of soft fair hair. 
 The other inmate of the carriage Gerald could 
 
 VOL. I. G
 
 82 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 see less distinctly, but she was evidently an 
 older woman. 
 
 It was to her that Captain Eaven was 
 talking. The young girl had glanced through 
 her window at the club and at Gerald standing 
 in the doorway, and it was in this brief glance 
 that Gerald had received the bewildering 
 impression of beauty. Then the young lady 
 had turned away, and Gerald only got a 
 glimpse of her side face as she nestled in the 
 white down of her cloak. 
 
 ' It was really most kind of you to drop 
 me,' Captain Eaven said. 
 
 ' Not at all,' the elder lady responded, and 
 Gerald liked her voice for its firm, kind tone. 
 ' It is not in the least out of our way. You 
 will not forget the great occasion.' 
 
 ' Could I possibly,' Captain Eaven an- 
 swered gallantly, ' while memory holds her 
 seat in this distracted globe ? '
 
 IN THE DOORWAY Zz 
 
 ' We shall make a convert of you in time,' 
 the elder lady replied. 
 
 'I am half converted already,' said the 
 Captain. 
 
 ' At least you shall see that women can do 
 some things as well as men. You will show 
 him what fencing is like, won't you, dear? ' 
 
 Captain Eaven turned his face to the young 
 girl. 
 
 ' That will be indeed dehghtful.' 
 
 The girl laughed a delightful laugh, and 
 spoke in a delightful voice. ' Wait till you 
 see it, Captain Eaven. Don't form rash 
 hopes.' 
 
 ' I shall form hopes, but they will not be 
 rash. So many thanks. Good-night.' 
 
 Captain Eaven closed the carriage door, 
 raised his hat, the ladies nodded and the 
 carriage drove rapidly away in the direction 
 of King Street. Eaven, turning round, recog- 
 
 G 2
 
 84 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 nised Gerald. He greeted him cheerfully. 
 ' Hullo I Aspen, my boy, how are you ? ' 
 
 ' I'm all right,' Gerald answered. ' I say, 
 look here — I want to speak with you.' 
 
 ' Certainly, my dear fellow, certainly. 
 Nothing wrong with the club, I hope. No 
 complaint ? No appeal to the Committee ? ' 
 
 Gerald laughed. 
 
 ' No, no ; the club is all right. I just want 
 a word with you.' 
 
 ' Eight you are. Did you see those 
 women ? Charming women ! ' 
 
 ' Yes. Who were they ? ' 
 
 ' What ! Don't you know ? Oh, you must 
 know them. Of course you've heard of them 
 though — a newspaper man like you.' 
 
 The two men were still standing in the 
 porch of the club. Gerald had his hand upon 
 the swing-door, and Eaven was looking with 
 an air of half-real, half-affected sentimentality
 
 IN THE DOORWAY 85 
 
 in the direction of King Street, as if to his 
 fancy the wheels of the departing carriage had 
 left behind them a hallowed track of golden 
 fire. 
 
 Gerald could not help laughing at the 
 troubadour air of the cynical club secretary. 
 
 ' What a fellow you are, Eaven,' he said. 
 ' Who are they, anyhow? ' 
 
 ' My dear boy,' said Eaven solemnly, ' one 
 of those two ladies was the charming Lady 
 Scardale, the other was the still more charming 
 Miss Locke.' 
 
 Gerald almost started with surprise. 
 
 « What— Fideha P ' he asked. 
 
 Captain Eaven eyed him curiously. 
 
 ' Oh, then you have heard of her.' he said. 
 ' That is Miss Fideha Locke.' 
 
 ' I heard of her by mere chance,' Gerald 
 hastened to explain. ' Her name was on a 
 card of invitation I received — in the regular
 
 86 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 way of business — to some function at some 
 college or other of which Lady Scardale — of 
 course I have heard of Lady Scardale — ^was 
 the patroness, and Miss Locke's name was on 
 the card.' 
 
 Captain Eaven nodded. 
 
 ' That is to be a big business, that func- 
 tion,' he said. ' Sort of going to teach the 
 world how to revolve out of its own orbit, I 
 believe. Dear Lady Scardale ! She's as good 
 and kind a woman as ever breathed, and she'd 
 be as happy as she's good if only she'd married 
 a good man. But there aren't many men with 
 that complaint about,' and Captain Eaven 
 laughed. 
 
 ' And Miss Locke,' Gerald queried, tenta- 
 tively. 
 
 'Oh, Miss Locke is a charming young 
 woman to whom Lady Scardale acts as guide, 
 philosopher, and friend. She is awfully clever,
 
 IN THE DOORWAY Sy 
 
 and awfully advanced, and Lady Scar dale 
 thinks no end of her — and so do a lot of other 
 people as well as Lady Scardale.' This time 
 Captain Raven did not laugh. 
 
 ' And she is pretty,' said Gerald, answering 
 aloud to his own silent thoughts. LP he had 
 gone on as he began he would have added, 
 ' and she doesn't wear spectacles and carry a 
 baggy umbrella after all.' 
 
 'Pretty ! I should think she is. She's 
 just beautiful. I wish all the women in 
 the world were as pretty. By Allah, hfe 
 would be Uke the Seventh Heaven in that 
 case.' 
 
 Captain Eaven had travelled considerably 
 in the East, and was fond of the East, and 
 amused himself and his friends by affecting 
 occasionally a Mohammedanism of language 
 and attitude towards occidental hfe. 
 
 'However,' he added, 'I suppose that
 
 88 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 wasn't what you wanted to talk to me about 
 — the charms of Miss Fideha Locke ? ' 
 
 ' Oh no. indeed,' said Gerald. 
 
 ' Then let's get inside and have it out.' 
 
 Captain Eaven pushed the door open and 
 the pair entered the hall together. Eaven 
 divested himself of his coat — a fur coat though 
 the April was mild, for the gallant Captain 
 professed an Oriental susceptibility to cold as 
 well as to female beauty. 
 
 'Let us go into the morning-room,' 
 said Eaven. ' Perhaps there is nobody 
 there.' 
 
 Into the morning-room they went, with its 
 series of fine engravings of famous travellers 
 all round the walls. Nobody was there as it 
 happened, so Eaven and Aspen sat down and 
 Eaven began to smoke. 
 
 ' Now then,' said Eaven, ' fire away. What 
 is it ? '
 
 IN THE DOORWAY 89 
 
 ' Did you ever,' asked Gerald, ' hear of a 
 man named Setli Chickering ? ' 
 
 * Seth Chickering ! ' Captain Raven blew a 
 cloud of smoke into the air and reflected 
 while it evaporated. ' Seth Chickering, Seth 
 Chickering ? Why yes, at least — no, I never 
 knew him, but that's the name of a man who 
 was elected to this club some time ago. 
 What do you know about him ? ' 
 
 'Nothing much. But he was here to- 
 night.' 
 
 ' The deuce he was ! Wliere did he turn 
 up from ? ' 
 
 Raven was leaning against the mantelpiece, 
 looking down at Gerald, who had dropped into 
 an armchair. Gerald, looking up at him, could 
 not help contrasting him in his mind with the 
 man they were talking about, with the man 
 who had just left him a few minutes ago. 
 
 Raven was very tall, and shghtly built.
 
 90 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 His black hair was closely cut ; his black 
 moustache was carefully waxed ; his black 
 eyes were very bright. The almost Spanish 
 darkness of his skin lent something of what 
 the French call a fatal air to his appearance. 
 He was very carefully dressed, and there was 
 about him something of that curious com- 
 pound of skill, quiet strength, and audacity 
 which suggested a blend of the ladies' riding- 
 master with the high-toned Mississippi 
 gambler. Yet with every word he spoke, 
 with every gesture he made, it was plain 
 that he was a gentleman. An adventurer, 
 perhaps ; he would scarcely have denied that, 
 but certainly a gentleman adventurer. Yes, 
 he was curiously unlike Seth Chickering, and it 
 was odd that they should have any connection 
 together. 
 
 ' Well,' said Gerald, ' he seems to have 
 turned up from South Africa. He sat at my
 
 IN THE DOORWAY 91 
 
 table and told me a long, rambling tale whicb 
 I couldn't quite make out. But there's a lot 
 about a diamond mine, and he had a lot of 
 diamonds with him, and he talked of your 
 brother ' 
 
 'Yes, I have a brother somewhere out 
 there,' Eaven remarked. 
 
 'Do you know I am very much afraid 
 from something he said that your brother is 
 no longer alive ! ' 
 
 ' Ah ! is poor old Jim dead ? ' Eaven gave 
 a little sigh, and followed it by a little shrug 
 of the shoulders. ' We weren't very fond of 
 each other. None of our family ever are. A 
 pity, I suppose. Can't be helped, eh ? ' 
 
 ' Of course, I can't be sure,' Gerald went 
 on. ' He may be mistaken, or I may have 
 misunderstood him. It was a most rambhng 
 story altogether, but anyhow it ended up by 
 his drinking more than was good for him.
 
 92 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 Then he insisted on going out, and he also in- 
 sisted on my taking charge of a pocket-book 
 for him. He seemed to have taken a sort of 
 fancy for me.' 
 
 ' I'm not surprised,' said Eaven, good- 
 humouredly. Eaven liked Gerald ; he who 
 had seen so much of the world and its ways 
 liked the energetic, enthusiastic young man 
 who had seen so little of either, and whose 
 very cocksuredness was entertaining to so old 
 a hand as Captain Jackdaw. ' Well ? ' 
 
 ' Well, I took the pocket-book, but really 
 I don't know if I ought to have. I went to 
 the door to give it back to him, but he had 
 gone, and just then you drove up. Look 
 here, Eaven, don't you think that as you are 
 secretary of the club I might entrust this 
 document to your safe keeping .^ ' 
 
 Eaven laughed. 
 
 'No, thank you, my boy. Catch me 
 accepting any responsibihty I am not obHged
 
 IN THE DOORWAY 93 
 
 to accept. No, you've taken the pocket-book 
 and you'd better take care of it until you can 
 give it to him again. Where's he stapng ? ' 
 
 ' He didn't say.' 
 
 ' Did he make any appointment ? ' 
 
 ' Oh yes, he said he would come to the 
 club to-morrow and then he would claim his 
 pocket-book.' 
 
 ' Well, there you are. You've only got to 
 keep it tiD then. I shall take care to be on 
 the spot to-morrow and see this Seth Chicker- 
 ing. I'd like to be sure about Jim, too.' 
 
 Gerald was going to say something to 
 Eaven about the possible heritage of dia- 
 monds, but then he thought he had better 
 not. After all, Seth Chickering's tale might 
 not be true, or Gerald might have mistaken 
 its drift. Anyhow it was no use to let Eaven 
 prematurely think himself the heir to an 
 inheritance of diamonds. So Gerald held his 
 peace.
 
 94 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 * Well ! ' said Eaven, ' what are you 
 going to do now ? Come and have a game 
 at billiards ? ' 
 
 ' No, thanks,' said Gerald. ' I'm off to a 
 function, magnificent show, Metropole — you'll 
 see all about it in the ' Catapult.' 
 
 'Shall I?' said Eaven. 'Then in that 
 case I won't bother about going myself. It 
 would be a pity to take the edge off my 
 appreciation of your splendid description by 
 forming any previous acquaintance with the 
 dull, commonplace reality.' 
 
 ' That's good of you,' said Gerald. ' Well, 
 I'm off. Good-night.' 
 
 ' Good-night,' said Eaven. 
 
 They had walked together into the hall. 
 Raven lounged slowly up the staircase in the 
 direction of the bilhard-room. Gerald 
 climbed into his overcoat and went off to his 
 festivity.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 WHAT HAPPENED IN ST. JAMES's STREET 
 
 St. James's Street must always be a steady 
 source of delight to the serious lover of 
 London. In its antiquity and its exceeding 
 modernity, at the same time, it exercises upon 
 the true lover something of the same charm 
 of abidingness, of permanency, which makes 
 the charm of Eome. For just as Rome in its 
 great degree has gone on in an unbroken 
 history ever since Romulus leaped over the 
 mud wall, and with that history one might 
 say increasing and not diminishing in interest 
 with the ages, so in its lesser degree St. 
 James's Street presents the same spectacle of 
 unfading vitahty. In this street are clubs
 
 96 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 that bore the same name when the world was 
 well-nigh two centuries younger. When the 
 world was well-nigh two centuries younger 
 St. James's Street was the centre of all that 
 was social, all that was political, all that was 
 brilliant and witty, and, for the matter of that, 
 wicked, in the world of London. The two 
 centuries that have made Hampstead and 
 Chelsea alike parts of London, which have 
 turned the city of Anne into the hugest 
 metropolis in the world, have left St. James's 
 Street very much what they found it. 
 Altered externally, it remains in spirit the 
 same — the centre of all that is social, all that 
 is political, all that is brilhant, and witty, and 
 wicked in the world of London. 
 
 Talk of haunted places ! No place in the 
 world is more haunted than St. James's Street : 
 not lonely Karnak, nor the ruin-crowned 
 Acropohs, nor the Coliseum. Well may the
 
 WHAT HAPPENED IN ST. JAMES'S ST. 07 
 
 vision of the dreamer call up mummified 
 Egypt in the Hall of the Kings ; people the 
 Parthenon with the youths and maidens of the 
 Pan-Athenaic festival, and crowd the deserted 
 Amphitheatre with the stately shades of 
 Imperial Eome. These are ruins ; the world 
 has passed them by ; in their desolation they 
 are the very places for the dreamer to sit in 
 and conjure up the ghosts of antique time. 
 But St. James's Street, with all its animation, 
 its crowd, its movement day and night, with its 
 stately buildings, its never-ending, ever-vary- 
 ing throng of passers-by — St. James's Street 
 is to the true visionary as ghostly a spot as 
 any ruined temple that Egypt, Greece, or Italy 
 can offer. Such a visionary standing in the 
 window of a St. James's Street club sees with 
 his mind's eye all the famous figures of some 
 six generations trooping by — St. John and 
 Swift, Harley and Hervey, Johnson and Gold- 
 VOL. I. H
 
 98 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 smith, and wild Eichard Savage, the greater 
 Fox, and the lesser Pitt, and the Walpole who 
 wrote letters, and evil ' Q,' and good Eichard- 
 son, and great Burke, and Beau Brummell, 
 and D'Orsay and Byron. What a company — 
 what ghosts — ^what memories ! The Pillars of 
 Karnak, the Hill of Athena, the circle of the 
 Coliseum cannot evoke shadows more wonder- 
 ful than are evoked by this bustling, brilliant, 
 living London street. 
 
 No reflections of this kind crossed the mind 
 of Mr. Seth Chickering as he lumbered into 
 St. James's Street a few minutes after he had 
 said good-night to Gerald. He may have 
 heard of St. James's Street before, but if he had, 
 the fact awakened no chord in his memory 
 when he now found himself in it. He had 
 turned through York Street into Jermyn 
 Street, and so striding rapidly, if somewhat 
 unevenly, along, had found himself in a
 
 WHAT HAPPENED IN ST. /AMES'S ST. 99 
 
 few seconds on the edge of St. James's 
 Street. 
 
 He stood at the corner of Jermyn Street 
 looking up and down : at Piccadilly ghttering 
 on his right, at the distant darkness of St. 
 James's Park on his left, where the great clock 
 of the palace showed like a moon in the 
 gloom. Mr. Chickering swayed for a few 
 moments in uncertainty as to the course he 
 should take. He had drunk a good deal, and 
 though he had a strong head he was a little 
 confused and dizzy, and as he paused now he 
 yawned sleepily. It may have been this 
 vague sense of fatigue which prompted him to 
 turn to the left rather than to the right — to 
 move in the direction of quiet and obscurity 
 rather than in that of noise and brightness. 
 Anyhow, he did turn to the left, and made his 
 way more slowly now down St. James's Street 
 towards the Park. 
 
 H 2
 
 lOO RED DIAMONDS 
 
 Whatever he was conscious of, he was 
 probably not conscious of the historical nature 
 of the ground he was treading, of all its as- 
 sociations, of all the great and famous ghosts 
 who 'had gone down that street before him — 
 and whom he was so soon to join. 
 
 But if no such appropriate reflections 
 crossed the heated brain of Mr. Chickering, 
 they danced agreeably enough in the mind 
 of another pedestrian. Almost at the very 
 moment when Mr. Chickering turned into 
 St. James's Street from Jermyn Street, another 
 man turned into St. James's Street from 
 Piccadilly, and proceeded to walk leisurely 
 down its left-hand side. He was a man who 
 was fond of indulging in occasional reflections, 
 and if these reflections were often of a some- 
 what obvious kind, he had at least made them 
 in so many out-of-the-way parts of the world 
 that the triteness of the reflections gained a
 
 WHAT HAPPENED IN ST. JAMES'S ST loi 
 
 dignity from the strangeness of the circum- 
 stances which evoked them. Just now St. 
 James's Street seemed stranger than the desert 
 and odder than Siberia to the meditative 
 crentleman who smoked his cicrar and 
 sauntered lazily along, pleasing his thoughts 
 by feeding them on the former fortunes of 
 St. James's Street, and amusing himself by 
 mentally conjuring up the shades of St. John 
 and of Fox to keep him company. 
 
 Suddenly he dismissed those stately ghosts 
 from his mind. Some considerable distance 
 away he caught sight of a bulky figure clad 
 in yellow garments, who was lumbering 
 along ahead of him. Something in the gait, 
 something in the garments, troubled the 
 spectator's mind. He came to a halt for a 
 moment, as lounging men will often do when 
 suddenly brought face to face with a problem 
 which requires concentration.
 
 102 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 Tlie form was familiar to him he felt sure ; 
 the very cut of the garments stirred him with 
 nebulous recollections. What was it ? Who 
 was it ? That the form was familiar to him 
 the lounger did not doubt for an instant ; he 
 had a good memory but he could not at the 
 moment place the personality. In which of 
 the many parts of the world he had been 
 familiar with did he boast an acquaintance 
 with a man so built and wearing just such 
 garments ? In vain he puzzled ; the hght 
 would not come. ' Bah ! ' he said to himself, 
 ' let us give chase and overtake him ; that 
 will solve the mystery.' And as he thought 
 he moved briskly forward again. But lo ! at 
 that very instant his quarry had vanished. 
 
 ' " The earth has bubbles as the water 
 hath," ' he quoted to himself as he paused 
 again, ' and this is of them.' It was certainly 
 a fact, the burly man in the yellow suit whom
 
 WHAT HAPPENED IN ST. JAMES'S ST. 103 
 
 he had seen only a minute before had vanished, 
 as completely as if the earth had swallowed 
 him. 
 
 ' Very funny/ muttered the lounger tc 
 himself. 'He can't have gone into a shop 
 because they are all shut. Perhaps he hves 
 here and has entered his lodgings.' 
 
 The meditative individual had fallen back 
 into his slow lounge again and proceeded on 
 his way, scanning with a certain curiosity each 
 house as he passed it in speculation as to 
 whether it was the one which sheltered the 
 mysterious apparition. Suddenly he came to 
 a pause. He had come, most unexpectedly, 
 to a gap in the continuity of the houses ; he 
 was standing at the mouth of a narrow court 
 which led abruptly off St. James's Street. It 
 was a very narrow court indeed ; the entrance 
 was no wider than the width of an ordinary 
 door. It looked very black within, though
 
 I04 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 there seemed to be some kind of feeble light 
 at the end of it. 
 
 The lounger whistled softly to himself. 
 
 ' Well,' he mused, ' I thought I knew St. 
 James's Street pretty well, but I never 
 remember seeing this court before. Live and 
 learn, by Jove ! To think that I have 
 travelled all over the globe, and learn for the 
 first time of the existence in my most familiar 
 street of a court which possibly dates from 
 the days of Anne.' 
 
 He gave a vigorous puff at his cigar. * I 
 wonder,' he went on reflecting, ^ if my quarry 
 could have dodged down here.' 
 
 As he thought, it seemed to him that he 
 heard the sound of voices dimly down in the 
 darkness — even that he heard something like 
 a fall. 
 
 ' I wonder if there is anything going on 
 down there,' the lounger asked himself.
 
 IVHAT HAPPENED IN ST. JAMES'S ST. 105 
 
 * Let me satisfy a natural curiosity and 
 see.' 
 
 At that second, and as he was just about 
 to advance into the darkness, he received a 
 violent shock. A man rushing right out of 
 the darkness cannoned heavily against him. 
 The lounger was a strong man, and strongly 
 built, but he staggered a little under the force 
 of the impact, and the man who fell against 
 him staggered also. As the rushing new- 
 comer staggered back he uttered a sound 
 more like a growl of animal rage and fear than 
 any articulate expression, even an oath. For 
 one moment his face was turned towards the 
 man against whom he had reeled, and was 
 distinctly visible in the light of the gas-lamp. 
 A bearded face with a shock head of hair 
 under a workman's hat, the hair of a ruddy 
 colour — that was all the lounger saw in the 
 brief glimpse afforded to him of his unexpected
 
 io6 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 and apparently involuntary assailant. The 
 next moment the man had turned and fled 
 swiftly and noiselessly down the street in the 
 direction of the Park, and was out of sight be- 
 fore the lounger had quite recovered his breath. 
 
 ' Well,' said the lounger to himself, ' that's 
 a rum way to behave. He was in a blazing 
 hurry and no mistake. What a face the 
 fellow had ! What made him so scared, too ? ' 
 
 As he put these questions to himself the 
 lounger, still standing in the entrance to the 
 little court, recovered the wind that had been 
 knocked out of him by the vehemence of the 
 fugitive's impetus. With his recovered breath 
 came the decision to go to the end of the 
 court, the discovery of whose existence had 
 so much surprised him. He walked slowly 
 on. The entrance was dark, narrow, and 
 dirty, running between two houses, and 
 suddenly coming to an end in a square, open
 
 WHAT HAPPENED IN ST. JAMES'S ST 107 
 
 place like a yard, walled in by the backs of 
 various buildings. It was a queer, dingy hole 
 enough ; the oddest kind of place to associate 
 with St. James's Street. 
 
 It was quite a small place, about as much 
 space as would be covered by an ordinary 
 house. It was shut in on all sides, except at 
 the mouth of the narrow passage, by the backs 
 of the houses. The backs of dingy houses in 
 crowded localities are seldom cheerful sights, 
 but it seemed to the stranger as if these backs 
 of houses looked especially depressing, and as 
 if the windows with which they were pierced 
 had an exceptionally lugubrious aspect. In 
 some of the windows lights were visible ; high 
 above, the blue heaven sparkled with stars. 
 The air of the place was close and oppressive, 
 and the new-comer felt as if he wanted to 
 gasp for breath. 
 
 ' What a beastly place ! ' he said to himself,
 
 io8 RED DIAMOhDS 
 
 as he stood in the mouth of the opening and 
 looked about him. ' I wonder if my myste- 
 rious friend Hves in this hole by any chance. 
 If so, I really do not envy him his choice of a 
 residence.' 
 
 He advanced a little, moving cautiously, 
 for the place was not well lighted. A single 
 gas-lamp protruding from the wall could 
 hardly be said to illumine the cheerless spot. 
 
 ' Talk about darkness visible,' the explorer 
 muttered to himself as he moved forward, still 
 impelled by the curiosity which had led him 
 to penetrate so far ; 'I should think this is 
 about the worst-lit place in the world. What 
 a cut-throat kind of hole it is ! ' 
 
 As he said this he came to a pause just 
 under the single gas-lamp. The light this 
 gave forth was indeed wretched ; it seemed to 
 fill the dismal spot with uncanny shadows, 
 and the lounger shuddered, involuntarily
 
 WHAT HAPPENED IN ST. JAMES'S ST. 109 
 
 acknowledging the depressing influences of the 
 place. As he did so his attention was attracted 
 by one shadow more uncanny than the rest — 
 a shadow in a corner that looked like the 
 huddled mass of a fallen body. The explorer 
 advanced towards it resolutely. It was not a 
 shadow ; there was something sohd there ; it 
 was the body of a man lying all in a heap 
 with its face turned to the wall ! 
 
 ' Is he drunk ? ' the new-comer asked 
 
 himself. ' Drunk — or ' He did not 
 
 finish his sentence ; but, stooping down, 
 touched the body. The touch was enough to 
 turn it back, and the hght fell full on the up- 
 turned face. It was the face of a dead man ; 
 there was no doubt of that ; but it was not the 
 sudden presence of death which so startled 
 the discoverer that he sprang to his feet with 
 a cry of surprise. The face was a familiar 
 one to him, very familiar. 
 
 ' Why ! ' he cried, ' it's Seth Chickerino- 1 '
 
 no RED DIAMONDS 
 
 CHAPTEE YI 
 
 MR. EATT GUNDY 
 
 The dead body of Seth Chickering lay on 
 the pavement of this little court within a few 
 yards, a few strides, of the great night-Hfe of 
 the West End — of the clubs and the cabs and 
 carriages, of the evening parties and the foot- 
 men and the linkboys, of the drinking-houses, 
 the cigar shops aflame with Hght, the tramping 
 feet of the policemen, the trailing skirts of the 
 street-walkers. It might have lain there still 
 longer but that the attention of the police was 
 called shrilly to it by the piercing scream of 
 a whistle, sounding exactly like that which 
 the police themselves put into frequent and 
 dissonant use. The whistle went on again and
 
 MR. RATT GUNDY in 
 
 again, sounding more keen and shrilly each 
 time. A couple of policemen at last came 
 rushing into the little court. There they saw 
 a man lying on the ground and another man 
 standing composedly near him. 
 
 ' Glad you have come at last/ the latter 
 said, with perfect composure, and turning a 
 cigar between his lips so as to get it more 
 conveniently placed. ' It was lucky for me I 
 learned how to make that whistle with my 
 fingers. Here's a man killed.' 
 
 ' Killed ! ' the policemen exclaimed with 
 one voice, but in properly repressed tones. 
 It is not wise to call the whole attention of the 
 public to the fact that yonder is foul murder 
 done. 
 
 ' Dead as a herring,' the man replied, still 
 in a tone as composed as though he were 
 giving intelligence concerning a slaughtered 
 rat or a victimised blackbeetle. The poHce-
 
 112 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 men examined the body, and just barely lifted 
 the head — the body was still warm, the limbs 
 had not yet become quite stiff, but poor Seth 
 Chickering was dead. He had been murdered 
 this very first night of his arrival in town. 
 He had seen about six hours of London life 
 all told. 
 
 Just at this moment a police inspector 
 came up, and in a few seconds was made 
 acquainted with the whole grim story — as 
 much as his subordinates knew about it. 
 Naturally, every eye, and indeed every bull's- 
 eye, was now turned upon the stranger, who 
 stood there as composedly as ever. 
 
 The inspector was not astonished. Inspec- 
 tors seldom are. In any case, murders are of 
 too frequent an occurrence in London to 
 surprise the most inexperienced of officials, 
 and this particular inspector was a man of 
 very considerable experience.
 
 MR. RATT GUNDY 113 
 
 He gave his orders quickly and quietly. 
 The great thing was not to arouse any un- 
 necessary alarm. A couple of policemen were 
 immediately stationed at the entrance of the 
 court to keep the curious out. Already people 
 were beginning to stop and a crowd to form. 
 But a couple more policemen judiciously broke 
 the crowd up, preventing it from congregating, 
 and declined to answer all inquiries, so that 
 the passers-by, seeing that no information 
 was forthcoming, soon went their way, and 
 only a few of the most incorrigible of loafers 
 loitered about the entrance to the court. Pre- 
 sently the stretcher and the doctor, for whom 
 the inspector had sent, arrived together. The 
 doctor pronounced the victim to be quite dead, 
 and the body of Seth Chickering was placed 
 upon the stretcher and conveyed to the nearest 
 police-station, followed, of course, by a little 
 crowd. 
 
 VOL. I. I
 
 114 RE.D DIAMONDS 
 
 In the meantime the inspector had been 
 having some conversation with the stranger, 
 who had told him very briefly and composedly 
 how he came to be there, and how he had 
 discovered the body. 
 
 ' Fun of the thing is,' he observed, ' that I 
 knew the poor fellow well.' 
 
 ' Don't quite see the fun, sir,' the inspector 
 said sternly. 'You will have to give some 
 account of yourself.' 
 
 ' Well, when I say fun I don't really mean 
 fun you know. I am sorry, very sorry for 
 poor Seth Chickering. What I mean is, it 
 is so odd, you know, that I should be stand- 
 ing just here, and he should be lying just 
 there ! ' 
 
 ' It is odd,' the inspector said, ' very odd ! 
 So odd that I must ask you at once to give me 
 some explanation as to how he comes to be 
 there, and you come to be here.'
 
 MR. RATT GUNDY 
 
 115 
 
 ' As to how he comes to be there I am 
 sorry I can't give you the faintest notion — for, 
 don't you see, I don't know any more than you 
 do yourselves. As to how I came to be here, 
 the explanation of that fact is as easy as lying 
 — ^I think these are Hamlet's words.' 
 
 ' His words are no e\'idence in this case,' 
 the inspector said sharply. ' This is no trifling 
 business, sir.' 
 
 * I think I have made it pretty plain that 
 I didn't consider it quite a trifling business, 
 seeing that I stood here and kept on whisthng 
 in a way that might have blown a man's lungs 
 out — and where were you police all the time, 
 I want to know .^ Patrolling St. James's 
 Street, I dare say — as if there was any 
 likelihood of a murder being committed 
 there ! ' 
 
 The inspector evaded that question. He 
 certainly had begun with some ugly suspicions 
 
 I 2
 
 Ti6 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 about the stranger, but it had to be acknow- 
 ledged that if the stranger had, for any 
 reason, wished to escape notice, he would 
 simply have had to walk quietly away. He 
 was a handsome man, well-dressed, with a 
 dark, drooping moustache, long hair of the 
 Wild West order, and an unkempt beard. He 
 was not tall, but he was built for strength 
 and activity, and had a dare-devil look in his 
 bright, dark eyes which would have made 
 him a remarkable figure anywhere. It was 
 perfectly clear that whatever the new-comer 
 had been doing he was not in any particular 
 alarm about it. 
 
 ' The queerest coincidence I ever saw,' he 
 remarked emphatically. 
 
 ' I must trouble you to come with me to 
 the station,' said the inspector. ' I have some 
 questions to put to you still.' 
 
 ' By all means,' said the stranger ; * as
 
 MR. RATT GUNDY 117 
 
 many questions as you like. But if it's all the 
 same to you, I should prefer to go in a cab. 
 There is probably a crowd outside, and a:^ I 
 am a modest, retiring man, I should ratlier 
 not walk up St. James's Street with a proces- 
 sion at my heels. If it's all the same to you, 
 of course — for I have crone throucrh more 
 uncomfortable experiences in my time.' 
 
 It was all the same to Mr. Inspector. He 
 explained to the composed stranger that he 
 need not consider himself under arrest, but 
 that he must answer some questions. The 
 pair walked to the entrance of the court. The 
 crowd had practically dispersed, following the 
 stretcher on which poor Seth lay, but there 
 were still one or two people hanging about, so 
 the inspector and the stranger jumped into a 
 hansom and drove to the station. For a 
 moment it crossed the mind of the inspector 
 that if the stranger had anythmg to do with
 
 ii8 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 the (jrime he might attempt to escape, but he 
 seemed so calmly indifferent that the inspector 
 dismissed the notion from his mind. At the 
 station the inspector resumed his interro- 
 gation. 
 
 ' May I trouble you for your name ? ' the 
 inspector asked. 
 
 ' Eatt Gundy/ was the prompt reply. 
 
 ' Queer sort of Christian name, Eatt,' 
 the inspector observed with a look of what 
 might be called well-regulated incredulity. 
 
 'Now, Mr. Inspector,' the stranger 
 observed, ' I take you to witness that I never 
 said I was a Christian. I may be a Jew — I 
 may be a Mohammedan — I may be a Buddhist 
 — I may be a follower of Madame Blavatsky 
 — I may be a member of the small and select 
 band who worship at the West Central shrine 
 of the late Auguste Comte ' 
 
 ' "Well, I don't know anything about him
 
 MR. RATT GUNDY 119 
 
 or about them,' the inspector said. ' I only- 
 asked for your name ' 
 
 ' And now you have got it.' 
 ' Yes — will you give it to me over again ? ' 
 ' With pleasure — Eatt Gundy.' 
 ' Eatt Gundy. How do you spell Eatt ? ' 
 ' One " t " more than the household scourge 
 — or the renegade politician ! Eatt — do you 
 see ? But I may reheve your mind by telling 
 you that I was not christened Eatt. Eatt is 
 short for Eandolph.' 
 
 * Eandolph is your name ? ' 
 ' Well, I don't want to be too precise as to 
 that. Eandolph is my name now — at present 
 — the name I choose to go by. It is quite as 
 much my name as Gundy.' 
 
 ' Then you have different names ? ' 
 ' Different names for different countries — 
 but not many of the whole lot. But you may 
 as well come off that, Mr. Inspector — you
 
 120 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 won't make much of my change of names. I 
 Uve in the Berkeley Hotel, St. James's Street, 
 and you will find that I have a pretty long 
 account at my bank, and I can easily get 
 plenty of highly respectable, not to say vir- 
 tuous, householders to give substantial bail 
 for my appearance to answer any charge that 
 may be brought against me.' 
 
 'You will please to observe, sir, that I 
 have not brought any charge against you.' 
 
 ' Shouldn't be surprised in the least even 
 if you had, Mr. Inspector ; I have had so many 
 charges brought against me in all parts of the 
 world. I have been in the hands of Judge 
 Lynch, and was very near suffering at his 
 hands, Mr. Inspector — I need not tell you 
 wrongfully, of course — and I have ad- 
 ministered the Judge's justice myself Don't 
 scruple making a charge against me if you 
 have one to make. I shan't bear any malice.'
 
 MR. RATT GUNDY 121 
 
 ' I am making no charge/ the inspector 
 said, rather impatiently. ' Time is going on, 
 Mr. — ah — Grundy.' 
 
 ' I want to be going on, too,' said the un- 
 abashed stranger. ' I call myself Gundy, if 
 you please — not that it much matters.' 
 
 'I want you to assist the course of justice 
 by telling me all you know about the death of 
 this man.' 
 
 ' About poor old Seth Chickering .^ I am 
 afraid I know very little. Poor dear old 
 Seth ! I knew him well out in South Africa, 
 and I have only come to town this very night, 
 and the first thing that happens to me, or very 
 nearly the first, is to trip over the corpse 
 of Seth Chickering here in the West End ! 
 Wonder whom old Chick left his pot of money 
 to?' 
 
 ' That does not concern me,' the inspector 
 said firmly, to repress, if possible, Mr. Gundy's
 
 122 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 tendency toward or from the immediate 
 subject. 
 
 ' It concerns me, Mr. Inspector, a good 
 deal, I can assure you ; for if old Seth has not 
 left his money to somebody in particular, I and 
 some other good folks come in for shares 
 of it.' 
 
 The inspector began to look astonished. 
 
 ' Do you mean to tell me,' he asked, ' that 
 this man and you were mixed up in some 
 money affairs — and that if he has made no 
 will you are to come in for some of the money 
 — and that you came to London this very 
 night, and the first thing you stumble on is 
 the dead body of your friend murdered here 
 in this court ? ' 
 
 ' Mr. Inspector, you have hit the nail on 
 the head ! You have got my story down to 
 the ground. Poor Seth and I were chums, 
 with others — and we had a lot of money to
 
 MR. RATT GUNDY 123 
 
 divide, and we promised among ourselves that 
 if any of us should die without making a will 
 the whole of his share should be divided next 
 January among the surviving jolly boys ; and, 
 by Jove, I am told there's a pretty girl among 
 the heirs ! I vote we give the whole share — 
 Seth's share — to her. What do you say, Mr. 
 Inspector — would not that be a handsome 
 thing to do ? 1 am quite serious, by Jove ! ' 
 
 ' But about this body, Mr. Gundy — do 
 please tell me all you know.' 
 
 ' With pleasure ; only sorry I have so little 
 to tell. Well, I'd been to a theatre, and I 
 had been smoking a cigar and having a quiet 
 drink, and I started to go home. Good Lord ! 
 how odd it seemed to walk aloncr the old 
 streets under such new conditions ' 
 
 'Yes, yes — never mind all that.' 
 
 'Eight, right — of course that wouldn't 
 interest you. Well, as I came past this corner
 
 124 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 a man was running out, and ran right against 
 me, and nearly knocked me over. I am 
 pretty firm on my pins, however, and I stood 
 fast, but I gave him a shove that nearly 
 knocked him over. I waited for him to pull 
 himself together, and I felt sure there would 
 be a fight, but he only ran away. Then I 
 heard a groan, I thought, and I went down 
 this lane, or court, or whatever you call it, 
 and I saw someone lying on the ground, and 
 I thought it was a drunken squabble, and that 
 my chap had knocked the other chap down. 
 I looked at the face of the man on the pave- 
 ment, and first I saw that it was my old pal 
 Seth Chickering, and next I saw that he was 
 dead — as dead as Julius Cgesar ! ' 
 
 'Were you not very much shocked and 
 surprised ? ' the inspector asked, somewhat 
 sternly. 
 
 ' Surprised ? Oh, well — yes — a little sur-
 
 MR. RATT GUNDY 125 
 
 prised, certaiDly, at the odd chance that 
 brought me on the spot just at the time. 
 Shocked ? — well, I can't say that I was — it 
 takes a great deal to shock me much. I have 
 seen ever so many men killed in my time, and 
 not too much fuss made about it. Where's 
 the good, you know ? When a man's dead, he's 
 dead, you know. Seth had got to die some 
 time, and I don't see that he could have done it 
 any better on the whole. I am sure I should 
 rather die in that neat, prompt sort of way 
 than be finished off by the Eussian influenza.' 
 It must not be supposed that while the 
 stranger was dehvering himself of these occa- 
 sional and intercalated dissertations on life 
 and death and other abstract questions, the 
 inspector was simply listening idle and open- 
 mouthed to the fluent expression of his 
 views. The inspector was making a pro- 
 found and astute study of Mr. Gundy. The
 
 126 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 inspector had been about the world himself a 
 good deal. He had been on the trail of fugitive 
 Englishmen in California and South Africa, 
 and in Queensland, Austraha. He knew 
 what sort of men and what codes of manly 
 honour are made by such places. He did 
 not assume that Mr. Gundy was in sympathy 
 with murder because he did not profess to 
 feel much surprise at the death of Seth 
 Chickering. Still, the coincidences were all 
 very remarkable. 
 
 ' You knew this part of the town before ? ' 
 the inspector asked with seeming careless- 
 ness. 
 
 * Oh, bless you, yes — I was brought up 
 
 here.' 
 
 ' Yes, I knew you were a Londoner.' 
 'Just so — the cockney may change his 
 spots but he can't cast his skin. But I'm not 
 ashamed of it, Mr. Inspector. In spite of
 
 MR. RATT GUNDY 127 
 
 all temptation to belong to a foreign nation, 
 I've remained an Englishman, Mr. Inspector — 
 I give you my honour — though what my 
 native country has ever done for me I should 
 find it pretty hard to tell you/ 
 
 Mr. Inspector had long settled in his mind 
 that, despite his swagger and his voluble talk 
 and his assumed rattle, Mr. Gundy was a 
 gentleman in the conventional sense of the 
 word. He had made a mental note of this 
 suspicion from the first ; it was growing to be 
 a conviction now. There was not much clue 
 in that, however. Many Enghshmen of good 
 family and bringing up had turned out ter- 
 rible scamps in Sacramento, or BaUarat, or at 
 the Cape. The very carelessness of the swag- 
 ger might be merely put on to brave away all 
 appearance of comphcity in crime. He must 
 have had somethincr to do with it, the in- 
 spector thought.
 
 128 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 ' The man who ran against you — had you 
 ever seen him before, Mr. Gundy ? ' the in- 
 spector asked — rather for form's sake. 
 
 ' Never set eyes on him before in all the 
 long and chequered course of my earthly 
 pilgrimage.' 
 
 ' You don't know who he was ? ' 
 
 ' Mr. Inspector, I put it to you as a man 
 of intelligence, if I never saw the chap before, 
 and never heard of him, how is it likely or 
 possible that I could know who he was ? ' 
 
 * Should you know him again if you were 
 to see him?' the inspector asked, almost 
 aggressively. 
 
 'Know him — yes — I should think I 
 should ! I never set eyes on any man once — 
 for one flash — that I shouldn't know again 
 after twenty years. Get that man for me, 
 Mr. Inspector, and I'll recognise him even if 
 his own mother should fail to make him out.'
 
 MR. RATT GUNDY 129 
 
 ' Well — we must look for hira first,' the 
 inspector said, with a thoughtful air. 
 
 'Yes — and you must catch him first. 
 By Jove, what a fool I was not to hold him 
 when I had got him ! ' 
 
 ' It was a pity,' the inspector observed 
 drily. 
 
 'But who in all creation could jump 
 to the conclusion that because a fellow runs 
 one down in the street at night he must have 
 been just that moment murdering one's own 
 old pal ? Your sneer or taunt, Mr. Inspector, 
 is unreasonable — the only unreasonable thing 
 I have observed about you, so far.' 
 
 ' Well, this whole story will have to be 
 told to the magistrate and the coroner.' 
 
 ' All right — I don't mind ; I rather like 
 telling a curious sort of story like that — all 
 the more if it puzzles wise and practical 
 dunderheads who cannot believe in any such 
 
 VOL. I. £
 
 I30 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 thing as a coincidence. Whom shall I have 
 to tell the story to ? The beak — the worthy- 
 magistrate, isn't he called ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, the magistrate and the coroner, I 
 suppose.' 
 
 ' All right ; I'm there.' 
 
 ' Well,' the inspector said, a Httle doubt- 
 fully, ' I am sure you will make no mistake 
 about coming, Mr. — ah — ah — Gundy.' 
 
 ' No mistake in the world. Tell me when 
 and where, and I'm then and there. Look 
 here, Mr. Inspector, would you mind walking 
 along with me — it's only a step — to the 
 Berkeley Hotel .^ They'll tell you that I have 
 taken rooms there, that I have been vouched 
 for by respectability, and that they have a good 
 lot of my money in charge for me. Come 
 along, and I'll give you a prime cigar and 
 anything you like to drink — if it isn't too late 
 to have a drink.'
 
 MR. RATT GUNDY 131 
 
 'No, thanks,' the inspector said thought- 
 fully. 'I'm sure it's all right, Mr. Grundy, 
 but I can't leave this place just now. No ; I 
 can take your word, I am sure.' 
 
 ' Of course, you could take my word if I 
 had given it. We don't break our words to 
 each other in the places where I have been 
 knocking about lately. Things wouldn't 
 hancr together at all if we did that. But 
 then, you see, Mr. Inspector, I have not given 
 you my word.' 
 
 ' No, but you mean to, I am sure,' the 
 inspector said, with a smile of winning confi- 
 dence and a gleam of sudden mistrust in his 
 heart. 
 
 'Eight you are. I give you my word 
 that I will appear at any time and place you 
 name to-morrow morning, and that you shall 
 never come into any sort of trouble by my 
 not turning up all right, provided only that I 
 
 K 2
 
 132 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 don't have my throat cut meantime by one of 
 your clever and seasoned London assassins. 
 Mr. Inspector, I wish you good-night.' 
 
 Mr. Gundy smiled a bright smile, hfted 
 his hat, put a cigar straight between his lips, 
 and sauntered away.
 
 133 
 
 CHAPTEK Vn 
 
 FIDELIA LOCKE 
 
 When the carriage containing Lady Scardale 
 and Miss Locke drove away from the 
 Voyagers' Club, after leaving Captain Eaven 
 on its threshold, the elder lady leaned back 
 with a half sigh. 
 
 ' Are you tired, dear Lady Scardale ? ' the 
 young girl asked. The question was an 
 ordinary question enough, but there was the 
 ring of genuine and deep affection in the voice 
 which uttered it. 
 
 ' No, my dear,' Lady Scardale answered, 
 reaching out her hand to take and hold that 
 of her companion. ' No, not exactly tired.
 
 134 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 Mrs. Seagreave's parties are always entertain- 
 ing and always interesting.' 
 
 ' Then why did you sigh, dear ? For you 
 did sigh. Come, you cannot deny that sigh.' 
 
 ' Can't I ? Very well, then, I won't.' And 
 Lady Scardale laughed a bright laugh that 
 had no suggestion of a sigh lurking anywhere 
 in it. 'I think I sighed because I was 
 thinking.' 
 
 ' Thinking ? Thinking of what ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, of many things. Of Captain Eaven 
 chiefly.' 
 
 ' My dear Lady Scardale, what is there to 
 sigh about in Captain Eaven ? I think he is 
 very well contented with himself.' 
 
 There was a shght, just the slightest, sug- 
 gestion of scorn in the girl's voice as she said 
 this. Lady Scardale's quick ear detected it, 
 and somehow it seemed to please her. 
 
 'It is because he is so well contented
 
 FIDELIA LOCKE 135 
 
 with himself that he makes me sigh. It 
 seems to me a pity that a man should be so 
 purposeless.' 
 
 ' But Captain Eaven isn't purposeless, Lady 
 Scardale. At present his great purpose in 
 life is the Voyagers' Club, and I'm sure nothing 
 ever seems to be going on in London that he 
 has not his name in — nothing amusing, that 
 is.' 
 
 ' Ah, yes, exactly, nothing amusing. But 
 that's just it. He has no serious purpose, no 
 great object, no high ideal.' 
 
 ' Dear Lady Scardale, why do you want 
 him to have all these qualities .^ ' 
 
 ' Well, because I hke him — I like him very 
 much — but ' 
 
 ' Well ? ' 
 
 ' Well,' Lady Scardale went on, ' I should 
 be sorry, my dear, if I thought that you liked 
 him very much
 
 136 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 Fidelia began to laugh, very brightly and 
 sweetly. 
 
 ' You need not be at all alarmed, dear 
 Lady Scardale. I am not at all likely to 
 care for Captain Eaven.' 
 
 'Well, Fidelia, he is an attractive man, 
 and I think, dear, unless I am mistaken, that 
 lie likes you very much.' 
 
 'Possibly he does,' said Fidelia, and the 
 smile on her face faded somewhat. ' Indeed, 
 I think it is probable that he does, but he is 
 not the kind of man I could ever care for.' 
 
 ' And what kind of man could you care 
 for, fanciful Fidelia ? ' 
 
 'Well, he should be such a man as you 
 spoke of just now. Lady Scardale ; a man 
 with a purpose, with an object, with an ideal. 
 Such a man as ' 
 
 ' As who ? ' 
 
 ' As my father was, Lady Scardale.'
 
 FIDELIA LOCKE 137 
 
 'Ah, you were thinking of your father. 
 Well, I was thinking of someone who was 
 dear to me once, and whom Captain Eaven 
 reminded me of always — my poor brother-in- 
 law, Eupert. He was wild hke Eaven, and 
 adventurous, and purposeless too.' 
 
 Lady Scardale sighed again. 
 
 For a little while there was silence between 
 the two women. The carriage had just passed 
 out of St. James's Park, and was rolling along 
 Buckingham Palace Eoad on its way towards 
 Chelsea. Each was busy with thoughts which 
 were sad thoughts, and which the brief con- 
 versation had called up and made very vivid. 
 They did not speak again until the carriage 
 had driven past Sir Hans Sloane's Physic 
 Garden and had stopped at Lady Scardale's 
 door. 
 
 The Physic Garden in Chelsea is a cu- 
 rious patch of old-fashioned, memory-haunted
 
 138 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 ground, wedged in by the most modern 
 devices of red brick and painted window. 
 Chelsea has of late completely metamorphosed 
 itself into a Queen Anneism which is much 
 more pronouncedly Queen Anneish than any- 
 thing that was ever known in the days of 
 Queen Anne herself. Along the Embankment, 
 and up and down the streets that run off it, 
 the red-brick houses cover all space, and 
 pubhsh themselves as old-fashioned with an 
 audacity which only draws the more attention 
 to their astonishing and even brazen newness. 
 The Physic Garden stands, a sort of grave 
 and dignified protest against all this innova- 
 tion. Its trees, its shrubs, its grasses have a 
 look of antiquity and proud decay. There is 
 one tree — a Lebanon cedar — which can be 
 seen from almost any point in the region, like 
 the famous tree that everybody looks at from 
 the Pincian Hill in Eome. From some back
 
 FIDELIA LOCKE 139 
 
 slum that seems as barren of interest and bare 
 of poetic association as a genteel street in 
 Pimlico, one can catch a ghmpse of this tree 
 just above the vulgar, commonplace roofs and 
 chimney-pots around, and the sight lifts one 
 in a moment into a realm of beauty, and 
 imagination, and memory, and brings thoughts 
 and fancies of far-off lands, and Eastern skies, 
 and Arabian Nights, and sacred waters. So 
 this tree often impressed itself upon the mind 
 of Fideha Locke. She never saw the tree's 
 broad crest uplifted in the distance but she 
 was borne away out of the commonplace 
 surroundings of the spot, and went out and 
 sailed away in a day-dream across the sea 
 towards the golden sunset, and was happy. 
 Indeed, she ought not to have been much in 
 quest of happiness, as mortals go, for she lived 
 a useful life that was entirely to her taste, and 
 she had a most generous friend and patroness
 
 I40 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 — a patroness who never patronised either 
 Fideha or anyone else — and she had, as yet, 
 no serious love troubles. Men had indeed 
 made love to her, and professed to be in love 
 with her, but her heart was whole and free. 
 Life was all opening freshly on her ; the 
 shadows all fell before her. 
 
 Not far from this famous Physic Garden, 
 inward from the Physic Garden, there is 
 another garden enclosed in walls, and of 
 which the careless passer-by never suspects 
 the existence. ' It was a merry place in days 
 of yore,' no doubt, to quote the language of 
 Wordsworth. It was the residence of some 
 great personage of Chelsea, and it had upon 
 its grounds a stately mansion-house. The 
 mansion-house and grounds have passed 
 through all sorts of changes since the ancient 
 seigniorial family dropped into decay and 
 finally disappeared : it was a collegiate school
 
 FIDELIA LOCKE 141 
 
 for boys, it was an art exhibition, it was a 
 medical establishment for the care of self- 
 surrendered inebriates. All these institutions 
 failed in their turn, and at last it was about 
 to be cut up into lots for building ground, and 
 would no doubt before long have been covered 
 with other red-brick houses ever so much 
 more Queen Anneish than Queen Anne's own 
 reign had looked upon, when it was suddenly- 
 bought up by the rich and philanthropic 
 Countess of Scardale and turned into an 
 entirely new-fashioned — not to say new- 
 fangled — encampment for the development of 
 self-reliance and other masculine virtues in 
 woman. 
 
 The Countess of Scardale was not a widow. 
 The Earl of Scardale was ahve and well, as far 
 as physical health was concerned. When 
 Lady Scardale was Miss Estropp, only daughter 
 of the rich banker and philanthropist, Sir
 
 142 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 James Estropp, slie fell in love with the young 
 Earl of Scardale, a man who was spending the 
 last of his family property that could be spent, 
 on gambling, and the turf and the stage, and 
 various other amusements. Miss Estropp fell 
 in love with him and he professed to fall in 
 love wdth her. She had an impassioned love 
 for converting souls to goodness, and Lord 
 Scardale offered himself and his soul for con- 
 version. Miss Estropp accepted the trust. 
 Her father protested in vain, and told the 
 girl he had never in all his experience known 
 an authentic case of a profligate man con- 
 verted by a rich marriage. His daughter 
 smiled her sweet and confident smile. ' He 
 loves me,' was her argument ; ' he will do 
 anything for me.' Her father was wise 
 enough not to argue too long, and the mar- 
 riage took place, and he died soon after, leaving 
 his daughter immensely rich. He died not too
 
 FIDELIA LOCKE 143 
 
 soon, for he did not live to see his sad fore- 
 bodings come true. Lord Scardale got all the 
 money he could out of his wife, indulged in 
 all his old and evil tastes, and finally left her 
 and went off to nobody well knew where with 
 another woman. Lady Scardale lavished a 
 great deal of her affection on a younger 
 brother of her husband's who was only a boy 
 when they married. He lived in their house 
 for years, and he stood by her when her 
 husband left her. But wildness had run in 
 the Scardale family for generations — one of 
 that blood could no more save himself from 
 the consequences of being a Scardale than he 
 could keep himself from the trials of humanity, 
 being a man. Scardab's young brother 
 became wild too, well-nigh wore out even the 
 sweet patience of his sister-in-law, and finally 
 went off to some dim and distant country, 
 declaring that he would make his fortune for
 
 144 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 himself, or would never return to civilised life. 
 Lady Scardale had heard nothing of him or of 
 her husband for many years. She was now a 
 tall, handsome, and stately woman of forty- 
 five. She never went into society. She spent 
 her life, her widowed hfe — her worse than 
 widowed life — in trying to do good. 
 
 Her chief efforts to do good were naturally 
 among women. Her great wish was to train 
 up girls, not, indeed, to remain single, but to 
 be able to live without making marriage a 
 profession — a trade — so that if they did marry 
 they should marry for some reason, and not 
 out of sheer necessity. It might have been 
 thought that she herself had married for a 
 reason and not out of sheer necessity, and 
 that, nevertheless, her marriage had not pros- 
 pered. But she felt all the same that up to 
 the time of her own experience in marriage 
 she had always understood that there was
 
 FIDELIA LOCKE 145 
 
 nothing for a girl to do but to marry. She 
 had always known that she must marry some- 
 body, and she had, with this previous assump- 
 tion to guide her course, allowed herself to 
 fall in love with Lord Scardale. So that even 
 her own case she looked on as contributing 
 only another illustration to the great argument 
 that women ought to be trained to encounter 
 life without any actual necessity for having 
 recourse to marriage. Had she been thus 
 trained, her hfe, she thought, might have been 
 more happy. 
 
 Lady Scardale bought the old domain near 
 the Physic Garden, and started a sort of 
 technical school for girls which was also to be 
 what may be called a culture school of life. 
 It was called the Chelsea Culture College, and 
 it meant a great deal by the word ' Culture.' 
 Girls were to be put in the way of learning 
 every art and craft by which a woman could 
 
 VOL. I. L
 
 146 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 make a living ; and they were also to be 
 taught how to live. Lady Scar dale did not 
 believe in the teaching of women exclusively 
 by women — she thought it must be at the best 
 somewhat narrow and enfeebhng. So she 
 had professors of all manner of arts and 
 sciences, teachers of fencing and gymnastics. 
 The girls learned to cook, to make and mend 
 clothes, to drive and ride, and even to groom 
 a horse. They took the household work in 
 turns, and they kept no servants. An un- 
 trained girl went at first into the class of 
 attendants, and while she was learning letters 
 and science she had to learn how to carry a 
 message and how to wait at table. The girls 
 thus gradually worked their way up. There 
 were no servants, or there were none but 
 servants — it might be put either way. Every 
 girl had learned how to be a servant. The 
 institution was conducted on the principle of
 
 FIDELIA LOCKE 147 
 
 practical equality. There were numbers of 
 young women there who had originally 
 belonged to the maid-of- ail- work class and who 
 now held good positions in the institution and 
 were fit to go out into the world as ladies — 
 if there was any way of making a living in 
 life as a lady. There were some married 
 women in the institution, with whom, through 
 no fault of theirs, marriage had proved a most 
 decided failure. The principle of payment 
 was simple — each resident or her parents 
 paid what they could. Lady Scardale arranged 
 for the admission of each, and would take no 
 one at any price who did not appear hkely to 
 improve herself and the institution by abiding 
 for a time in it. She had several girls there 
 who paid nothing — for whom she paid — 
 whom she had rescued from miserable homes 
 and drunken parents ; but Lady Scardale 
 never told their story to any of the other girls.
 
 148 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 She had herself thought at one time of drop- 
 ping her own title and calling herself Sister 
 Scardale or Mrs. Scardale or Miss Estropp or 
 something of the kind ; but she came to the 
 conclusion that it would seem like mere affecta- 
 tion or eccentricity, and she detested affectation 
 and eccentricity. Besides, she had been far too 
 much a woman of the world not to know 
 quite well what an effect in strengthening the 
 public influence of an institution like hers 
 would be obtained from the fact that its presi- 
 dent was a countess. Lady Scardale was the 
 president of the institution ; the vice-president 
 was Miss Fidelia Locke. 
 
 Lady Scardale had appointed Miss 
 Fidelia Locke to the proud position of vice 
 president because she found her sympathetic 
 and capable, and because she was touched by 
 her story. Fideha Locke was not exactly an 
 orphan, but she was practically alone in the
 
 UDELIA LOCKE 149 
 
 world when chance threw her in the way of 
 the benevolent woman who, though not 
 exactly a widow, was practically alone in the 
 world also. Each day that they passed in 
 work together brought them more and more 
 into companionship. Fidelia was a girl of 
 twenty two or three, with a handsome, melan- 
 choly face. She had deep eyes that sometimes 
 Hashed up with sudden light, suggesting a 
 suppressed strength of emotion and passion, 
 and a mouth that quivered to every ripple of 
 feeling. One might have set her down for a 
 girl who would in ordinary conditions have 
 had a self-willed and ' masterful ' temperament 
 enough, had it not been early checked and 
 made patient by trouble. 
 
 Fideha went to Lady Scardale's room for a 
 little talk, as she always did when they came 
 home from any festivity together. 
 
 ' I am glad to talk to you, Fideha,' Lady
 
 ISO RED DIAMONDS 
 
 Scardale said. ' You were not looking well 
 to-day — not quite like yourself, I thought. 
 You ought to have a holiday, child. Would 
 you not Hke to go anywhere .^ ' 
 
 ' Oh no, dear Lady Scardale ; I am quite 
 well. I should not like to go anywhere — at 
 least, anywhere away from you.' 
 
 Lady Scardale smiled. 
 
 'That is very sweet of you,' she said. 
 ' But all the same, I don't think so much 
 of London quite agrees with you. This 
 is a sort of hermitage. It is all very well 
 for the old who have lived their Hves — like 
 me.' 
 
 ' It has nothing to do with that,' Fidelia 
 said simply ; ' but just now I am very 
 unhappy.' 
 
 ' I know, dear child,' Lady Scardale said 
 gently — soothing the girl by a caressing touch 
 on her cheek as if she were really only a little
 
 FIDELIA LOCKE 151 
 
 child, whom the touch of a loving hand could 
 encourage and strengthen. 
 
 ' I thought when first I came here,' Pidelia 
 said, ' that I could charm away all my own 
 troubles by trying to relieve some of the 
 troubles of other people. But I am not good 
 enough for that. Lady Scardale — I am not 
 unselfish enough. My own troubles get in 
 my way and fill up my heart.' 
 
 ' I once,' said Lady Scardale gravely, 
 * knew a very pious and beheving man, who 
 knelt to pray at a shrine in a foreign country. 
 As he was kneeling a minute particle of dust 
 got into his eye and tormented him, and he 
 told me he could not pray — every high 
 thought was driven out of him by that grain 
 of dust in his eye. The troubles of the world 
 are a good deal like that to all of us, Fideha.' 
 
 ' I wish my only trouble were a grain of 
 dust in my eye,' Fidelia said sadly. She did
 
 152 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 not say it impatiently, for she did not fancy 
 for a moment that her friend and patroness 
 was making light of her troubles. She knew 
 Lady Scardale's way. 
 
 'It would be a pity if anything were to 
 spoil your bright eyes, Fidelia ; I would rather 
 see them spoiled for the moment by dust than 
 by tears. We could get the dust out, I 
 dare say, easily enough — but not the tears. 
 I have seldom seen tears in your eyes, but 
 when they get there they are apt to stay 
 there — or to come again and again, I am 
 afraid.' 
 
 'I am sure my father is dead,' Fideha 
 said. ' I have dreamed of him night after 
 night lately — and always dreamed of him 
 as dead. Oh, how shall I ever live without 
 him ? ' 
 
 'You were very fond of your father, 
 Fidelia?'
 
 FIDELIA LOCKE 153 
 
 ' Oh yes, Lady Scardale — I was all devoted 
 to him — and he was so fond of me ! He went 
 away for nothing but to make money for me. 
 He never would have cared to go exploring 
 about the world but for me. He could not 
 bear to see me poor — he was always saying 
 so — and I didn't care — oh, I didn't care one 
 straw so long as I had him ! What did it 
 matter to me if we were poor? There are 
 troubles ever so much worse than being 
 
 poor- 
 
 ' There are indeed, FideHa. I have never 
 known what it was to want for money — and I 
 have not been happy, and everything has 
 gone wrong with me ' 
 
 ' No, you have not been happy, dear Lady 
 Scardale — you have not indeed ! ' Fidelia 
 said with emotion, clasping her companion's 
 hand. ' I am ashamed to talk of my troubles 
 when I think of yours. But you can do so
 
 154 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 much good — you are always doing so much 
 good — your whole life is all goodness.' 
 
 ' Tell me about your father, Fidelia. Have 
 you any reason to fear that he is dead ? ' 
 
 ' Only my dreams — oh yes, and the fact 
 that I have not heard from him so long. You 
 know people used to say he was more like my 
 lover than my father — why, Lady Scardale, 
 if I only put a fresh bunch of flowers in 
 my dress he would study me as if I were a 
 picture. Oh, he so spoiled me ! I was not 
 fit for the world, he loved me so and I loved 
 him so, and we so spoiled each other. He 
 never told me he was going away — he 
 knew I would not let him — I would have 
 clung to him — I would have hung on his 
 neck — he never should have gone, or at 
 least he should have taken his daughter with 
 him ! Then he wrote to me from Australia, 
 and then from the Cape, and he told me he
 
 FIDELIA LOCKE 155 
 
 was going to the diamond mines. He wrote 
 regularly, and said he was not going to allow 
 me to sink into poverty, and then he was so 
 glad when you were good to me, and lately 
 he told me he hoped soon to make his fortune 
 and to come home rich — for me — always for 
 me ; and since then I have not heard any more, 
 and I know he is dead. Oh yes — he is dead ! ' 
 'It is hkely enough,' Lady Scardale 
 thought ; but she would not communicate that 
 thought to her young friend. ' There are far 
 worse calamities than death,' Lady Scardale 
 thought ; but that thought, too, she would 
 not communicate to her young friend. Ah 
 yes, she was thinking — there are worse 
 troubles, too, than the death even of someone 
 we dearly love ! There may be the moral 
 decay, the moral death, the gradual extinction 
 of the better spiritual nature, the protracted 
 hfe that is only a Hving death ! But this 
 
 ^
 
 156 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 thought, too, she forbore to communicate to 
 her young friend. In truth, all that Lady 
 Scardale had heard about Captain Locke from 
 various sources had not quite supplied her 
 with such a pleasing picture of him as his 
 daughter's loving hand would have painted. 
 She had heard from everyone that he was very 
 fond of Fidelia in an idolatrous and absorbing 
 sort of way ; but she had heard, too, that he 
 was a heedless, good-for-nothing creature, 
 pursuing his own whims and follies recklessly, 
 hot-tempered, jealous, eager to quarrel, capable 
 of anything rather than patience. Wherefore, 
 she regarded it as not at all impossible that 
 such a life might have come to a sudden and 
 tragic end in such a place as the mining region 
 of the Yeldt. 
 
 'You must not keep looking out for the 
 worst, my dear child,' Lady Scardale said 
 gently, but without too much encouragement
 
 FIDELIA LOCKE 157 
 
 in her voice. ' Come what will, Fidelia, you 
 know you have always a home and a friend.' 
 
 ' Oh, yes I know it well ! ' Fideha exclaimed ; 
 ' but do you know — no, you could not think — 
 how wicked and ungrateful I am to you and 
 to heaven, and to everyone? I sometimes 
 wish I had not a home when I think that he 
 may be lying homeless, unburied, under the 
 southern stars.' 
 
 ' My dear ! ' Lady Scardale softly interposed. 
 
 ' It is no use, Lady Scardale, reasoning 
 with me or trying to bring me to what is 
 wise and right and submissive. I know 
 already it is right and wise. I know I ought 
 to be submissive, only I can't submit ! I can 
 only think that if he is dead, he died for 
 me!'
 
 158 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 CHAPTEE YIII 
 
 THE POCKET-BOOK 
 
 Geeald Aspen lived in a set of chambers high 
 up in an ancient house at the foot of one of 
 the streets leading from the Strand to the 
 river. They were cheap, for the young 
 lieutenant of the ' Catapult ' had to husband 
 liis resources ; but they were comfortable, 
 they were clean, and because they were high 
 up they possessed an unrivalled view. To 
 left and right the river wound its way 
 between the stately embankment of the one 
 side and the crazy wharves of the other. In 
 the greenness of summer, in the greyness of 
 winter, Gerald always found the prospect 
 from his watch-tower a pleasure for his gaze ;
 
 THE POCKET-BOOK 159 
 
 and of nights, summer nights, it gratified him 
 much to open his windows and lean out, 
 propped on his elbows, far into the night, and 
 to fancy himself, like the poetic notary of 
 Jean Paul Eichter's story, with his eyes in 
 the stars and his soul in the blue ether. It 
 pleased him, too, to fancy that from the high 
 pitch of his lodging he could look down hke 
 another Diogenes Teufelsdrockh upon the 
 absurd imbroglio of the world beneath him, 
 and survey it with the calm eyes of a serene, 
 impartial philosopher. Gerald Aspen was 
 still very young. 
 
 On the morning after his meeting with 
 the curious stranger in the club, he awoke at 
 a late hour, but still with a sense of fatigue 
 strong upon him. He had gone to his social 
 entertainment — it was a ball given by a great 
 financier to the ladies of the Frivohty Theatre — 
 and he had danced a little and supped a Uttle,
 
 j6o red diamonds 
 
 and finally he had come away and walked 
 home, and had written his account of the 
 revelry in time to catch the last post, and had 
 read a few pages of fiction to clear his mind, 
 and Big Ben was chiming half-past three 
 when he put out his light and slipped with 
 the swiftness of still unspoiled youth into the 
 spaces of dreams. Now, as he lay half awake 
 and looking at the sunshine coming through 
 his window, the great clock chimed again, 
 and he lay lazily listening to its strokes. ' I 
 wonder what time it is,' he said to himself, 
 luxuriously enjoying his monarchy of the 
 lubberland of bed ; ' it must be getting on to 
 ten o'clock.' But the chimes did not stop at 
 the tenth stroke ; they went on for two 
 strokes beyond. 
 
 ' Twelve o'clock ! ' said Gerald. ' By 
 Jove, I am late this morning ! ' and he assured 
 himself mentally that he must get up imme-
 
 THE POCKET-BOOK i6i 
 
 diately and go about the day's work. But he 
 did not get up immediately and go about the 
 day's work, for his wakened mind was occu- 
 pying itself with the night's work. A con- 
 fused medley of memories floated before him : 
 the pretty dresses and pretty faces of last 
 night's dancers ; and through all the pretty 
 faces and the pretty dresses he was anxious 
 to pursue two other memories, somewhat 
 formless and intangible, which he was trying 
 to reduce to clearer proportions. At last the 
 first of these memories took the form of a 
 woman's face, framed in the open window 
 of a carriage. It was a very beautiful face, 
 crowned with soft, golden hair — -o. face in 
 which a curious expression of melancholy 
 contrasted with its girlish freshness — a face 
 with very bright eyes, which also were full of 
 melancholy. Through all his dreams that 
 face had floated, alluring, inspiring,, blending 
 
 VOL. I. M
 
 i62 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 strangely with the fantastic visions of dancing 
 feet and laughing lips, which his last night's 
 revel had set stirring in his dreaming brain. 
 Now, awake, he sighed for it, as one does 
 sigh on awaking for some visionary phantom 
 of delight that has greeted the sleeper in the 
 kingdom of dreams. Then the sigh changed 
 to a smile, as Gerald remembered that the 
 beautiful, wistful face was no mere creation 
 of sleep, but the face of a living girl, of a girl 
 whom he was likely soon to meet, the face of 
 Fidelia Locke. 
 
 But there was another memory haunting 
 him as well as the memory of the face of 
 Fidelia Locke. It was a perplexing memory 
 of something not beautiful, of something 
 fantastic, something incongruous, which 
 worried him because he could not quite realise 
 it, could not, as it were, piece together the 
 puzzle of shifting recollections that was
 
 THE POCKET-BOOK 163 
 
 occupying his mind. Suddenly, however, it all 
 came back to him in the suddenness with 
 which such things do come. The chaos of 
 scattered memories combined and evolved the 
 form of a big man in yellow garments, and 
 the picture of his companion at dinner on 
 the previous evening rose before him. Im- 
 mediately Gerald's mind proceeded along the 
 track of the entire episode at the Voyagers' 
 Club, and he found the episode so fantastic, so 
 preposterous, that he decided within himself 
 that the whole story must be neither more nor 
 less than a dream, begotten of a late supper 
 and the production of a column of copy there- 
 after. But even as he came to this sober 
 decision he turned his eyes towards his dress- 
 ing-table and saw lying there, in the spot 
 where he had placed it the previous night, the 
 leather pocket-book which the mysterious 
 
 n 2
 
 i64 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 stranger had insisted upon entrusting to his 
 care. 
 
 ' Then it's not a dream, after all,' Gerald 
 said in surprise ; and the sense of his surprise 
 lasted him all through the process of dressing, 
 until the moment when he rang his bell for his 
 landlady to bring him his breakfast. Before 
 the breakfast arrived he did what till then he 
 had delayed doing, out of a whim for reserving 
 the convincing proof of the reality of his 
 vision to the moment when he was definitely 
 equipped to face the world. There it was, no 
 doubt of it, just as he had left it last night — 
 the same black leather pocket-book fastened 
 with a silver clasp, which Gerald had, in spite 
 of his very natural curiosity, left unopened. 
 
 Gerald thought of the hero of the French 
 story who dreams that he is visited by a 
 princess of ancient Egypt, and who on waking 
 finds that she has left her slipper behind her
 
 THE POCKET-BOOK 165 
 
 as a proof of the reality of the vision. But 
 the bulky black pocket-book was a far raore 
 serious responsibility than the pantoufle of a 
 daughter of the Pyramids, and he resolved to 
 return it to its rightful owner at the very 
 earhest opportunity. 
 
 As he made this resolve his breakfast 
 arrived, accompanied by the morning's papers. 
 To Gerald, as an adventurous journalist, the 
 morning paper was a treasure-house of 
 delightful possibilities, and when he had 
 poured himself a cup of tea he carefully un- 
 folded one of the journals and propped it up 
 before him on the table at the most convenient 
 angle for reading. 
 
 The first thing that caught his eye was a 
 column on the principal page headed in large 
 letters : — 
 
 'MYSTERIOUS MURDER LAST NIGHT 
 IN THE WEST END ! '
 
 1 66 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 This was evidently the chief feature of the 
 morning's news, at least to the reporting mind ; 
 and Gerald, with an eye to possible usefulness 
 for the later editions of the ' Catapult,' began 
 to read it with a careless interest. But after 
 a line or two his interest deepened absorb- 
 ingly, and for a few seconds he asked him- 
 self in startled astonishment whether he 
 was not still dreaming. For the story was 
 the story of the murder in St. James's 
 Street, and the name of the victim was Seth 
 Chickering. 
 
 There was no mistake about it. The man 
 in whose company he had dined last night, the 
 man to whose strange story he had listened, 
 the man who had insisted on entrusting him 
 with the pocket-book which was now in his 
 possession, the man with whom he parted in 
 St. James's Square only a comparatively few- 
 hours earlier, was dead — murdered, struck
 
 THE POCKET-BOOK 167 
 
 down in the most mysterious way by some 
 unknown hand. 
 
 Gerald's head seemed to swim, the whole 
 thing was so strange, so sudden, so horrible. 
 A feeling of pity for his friend of a night 
 blended grimly with a personal repugnance to 
 be mixed up in the matter, and with, at the 
 same time, a curious interest in finding him- 
 self so mixed up. For that he was mixed up 
 and very much mixed up in the matter was 
 only too obvious. Even if he had simply met 
 poor Seth Chickering and had parted from 
 him with no confidences of any kind exchanged 
 between them, Gerald Aspen would have 
 been bound to come forward and tell all he 
 knew. 
 
 But the conditions were much more 
 serious. Here he was, with a portion of the 
 personal property of the dead man in his 
 possession, with a portion of a very singular
 
 i68 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 story told by the dead man still fresh in his 
 memory. It was clearly Gerald Aspen's duty 
 to lay, and that speedily, all the information 
 he possessed about Seth Chickering before the 
 proper authorities, and to entrust the myste- 
 rious pocket-book to their keeping. 
 
 It must be admitted that for all his horror 
 Gerald felt a certain professional satisfaction 
 in being so closely implicated in the St. James's 
 mystery. A man is not one of the favourite 
 lieutenants of the ' Catapult ' for nothing, and 
 it was not unnatural that an enthusiastic 
 journalist should experience a thrill of satis- 
 faction on reflecting how very much his own 
 journal would be 'in the know' about the 
 matter on which all London must now be 
 talking. 
 
 But this cheering reflection was barred by 
 another which was distinctly less cheerful. 
 How if his connection with the mystery got
 
 THE POCKET-BOOK 169 
 
 him into grave difficulty ? How if he were 
 not able to explain to the satisfaction of the 
 authorities the way in which the pocket-book 
 of the murdered man came into his 
 possession ? For a single second, but only 
 for a single second, as this thought flashed 
 across his mind, did it occur to Gerald that it 
 would be better for himself if he were to leave 
 * well ' alone and quietly drop the compromis 
 ing pocket-book into the river or into the fire, 
 and so save himself from all complication. 
 The thought only came to be dismissed. 
 With the air of a Spartan, Gerald finished his 
 breakfast, assured himself of the presence of 
 the mysterious pocket-book in his breast 
 pocket, buttoned his overcoat heroically, and 
 started off for Scotland Yard. 
 
 But if Gerald had been surprised by the 
 discovery of the pocket-book and the story of 
 the murder, greater surprises still were in
 
 170 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 store for him. The poor fisherman in the 
 Arabian tale was not more astounded when 
 the jar his net had captured proved to be the 
 prison of a genie, than Gerald was when the 
 pocket-book which had come so curiously into 
 his possession was opened and its contents were 
 revealed. The pocket-book contained in the 
 first instance an immense quantity of very 
 valuable diamonds, imbedded, as such treasures 
 usually are by the adept, in thin layers 
 of gutta-percha. Then came two sealed 
 envelopes. The first contained a formal copy 
 of the agreement w^hich Seth Chickering had 
 told Gerald of — the agreement binding every 
 member of the little association in a common 
 bond. The second envelope contained the 
 names of all the members of the association, 
 with the names of all the persons to whom, in 
 the case of the death of the original owners, the 
 money was to go on the first day of the next
 
 THE POCKET-BOOK 171 
 
 January. To Gerald's utter amazement the 
 first name on the Hst was his own. John 
 Aspen was tlie oldest member of the associa- 
 tion. John Aspen was undoubtedly Gerald 
 Aspen's long-lost father. John Aspen had 
 given the name of his only son, Gerald, as 
 his heir in the case of his death, and John 
 Aspen was dead, and Gerald was heir to his 
 share of the fortune. 
 
 The names of the company were carefully 
 set forth in the document, and after each of 
 the names something was written in pencil by 
 Seth Chickering. The first name, as we have 
 seen, was that of John Aspen. Opposite 
 that Chickering had written : ' Dead. Over- 
 dose chloral, taken by mistake.' 
 
 The next name on the list was that of 
 Captain Eeginald Locke. Opposite his name 
 Seth Chickering had written : ' Killed in fair 
 fight by ' and then there came only a
 
 172 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 stroke of the pencil, and no name filled up the 
 blank. The inheritor of his fortune was 
 stated to be a Miss Fidelia Locke, who was 
 described as living in London under the care 
 of the Countess of Scardale. 
 
 Fancy the thrill that went through 
 Gerald's heart ! Last night he had been weav- 
 ing fancies over the face, seen for the first 
 time, of Fidelia Locke — and now ! 
 
 The third name was that of the Honour- 
 able George Percy Eaven, second son of Lord 
 Wallington. Opposite his name was written : 
 'Found dead outside camp, murdered by 
 Noah Bland.' His heir was set forth in the 
 agreement as his younger brother. Captain the 
 Honourable John Eaven. 
 
 The fourth name on the list was that of 
 Noah Bland, opposite which was written : 
 * Lynched,' followed by a date some two 
 months earlier. His heir was stated to be
 
 THE POCKET-BOOK 173 
 
 his son, Japhet Bland, but no address 
 was added nor any hint as to his where- 
 abouts. 
 
 The fifth name was that of Ratt Gundy, 
 opposite to which Seth Chickering had 
 written the one word : ' Vamosed.' In this 
 case the name of no heir was given. 
 
 The sixth name was Seth Chickering's 
 own. Nothing was written opposite, and no 
 heir's name followed.
 
 174 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 CHAPTEE IX 
 
 THE CULTURE COLLEGE 
 
 Lady Scaedale had certainly been fortunate 
 in the site she had found for her Culture 
 College. It was within sight of the river ; it 
 was close to the Physic Garden. Originally 
 it had been several houses, that is to say, it 
 had been the stately old house with several 
 modern smaller houses clustering around it. 
 Lady Scardale had been lucky enough to get 
 the whole place, and had so altered and 
 improved it as to make it one of the wonders 
 of the neighbourhood. She pulled down the 
 small houses ; she made additions to the 
 stately old house ; she ran all the various 
 gardens into- one, which was laid out with
 
 THE CULTURE COLLEGE 175 
 
 such skill that it actually seemed rather a 
 park than a large garden. It really was an 
 exceedingly large garden for London, even 
 for Chelsea, where large gardens do still 
 linger ; and, moreover, the Physic Garden 
 was just across the road, so that the fair col- 
 legians of the Culture College had no lack of 
 fresh air, of trees and grass, to hghten their 
 labours and preserve their health. All round 
 the Culture College ran a high wall, which 
 gave to its green garden a dehghtful air of 
 scholastic, almost monastic seclusion. 
 
 But there was nothing at all gloomy about 
 the seclusion of the garden of the Culture 
 College at any time, and on this particular 
 afternoon of late April it was looking very 
 cheerful indeed. For this was the day of the 
 celebration at the Culture College to which 
 Gerald Aspen had been bidden, and of which 
 Lady Scardale had reminded Captain Eaven
 
 176 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 on the previous evening when they parted 
 at the door of the Voyagers' Club. The day 
 was fortunately fine. The month had not 
 been pleasant. April seldom is pleasant in 
 England, in spite of Chaucer's praises and the 
 praises of that latter-day Chaucer, Mr. William 
 Morris, whose song of April's ' loveliness ' is 
 exquisite enough to make men forget that the 
 ' breezes soft that o'er the blossoms of the 
 orchards blow ' generally blow from the east, 
 and are bitter and biting. 
 
 But this particular day was really fine ; 
 almost like an ideal April day ; as near, 
 perhaps, to an ideal April day as London 
 ever gets. The air that had so long been 
 wintry had for the first time a suggestion of 
 warmth about it, of warmth and an awaken- 
 ing world. The sun shone royally, flinging 
 the largesse of his golden light about with 
 generous profusion, as if to compensate by a
 
 THE CULTURE COLLEGE 177 
 
 sudden prodigality mortals beggared by a 
 stripping winter. The delicate pink stars of 
 the almond-blossom made the garden a glory 
 of blushing pink, and the bursting buds lent 
 their soft tones of tender green to the 
 luminous beauty of the Spring colouring. 
 
 There was a great deal of animation in the 
 neighbourhood of the Culture College on that 
 April afternoon. The great gate stood open 
 all the day, and carriages and cabs kept 
 driving up and depositing visitors at the 
 portal. A httle crowd clustered about the 
 door and stared at the arrivals, and peered 
 through the open gate into the mysterious 
 region beyond, and enjoyed itself very much, 
 as a gaping crowd always does. Inside the 
 gates the Culture College was all alive, for the 
 various guests who had been bidden to inspect 
 the College on this the day of its first anniver- 
 sary were wandering all over the building, 
 
 VOL. I. ]N'
 
 178 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 under the guidance of affable young collegians 
 told off for that special duty. When the guests 
 had seen all that was to be seen, and had 
 thoroughly satisfied their thirst for knowledge 
 on every particular of the working of the 
 scheme, they were conveyed into the great 
 garden at the back, where Lady Scardale 
 received them, and where there were tents at 
 which tea awaited the thirsty. Lady Scardale 
 stood in the centre of the garden, surrounded 
 by a little group of personal friends, and 
 received each new visitor, or set of visitors, 
 graciously. Fidelia Locke was here, there, 
 and everywhere — superintending, explaining, 
 assisting. 
 
 One of the fair collegians came towards 
 Lady Scardale. She had a card in her hand, 
 and she explained to Lady Scardale that the 
 owner of the card wanted a few moments' 
 private and urgent conversation. Lady
 
 THE CULTURE COLLEGE 179 
 
 Scardale read the name, ' Mr. Gerald Aspen, 
 Embankment Chambers, Yilliers Street, Strand, 
 and Voyagers' Club, St. James's Square.' 
 
 Lady Scardale had never heard the name 
 before, but of course all manner of unknown 
 people were constantly calling on her, and 
 she never refused to see anyone. But the 
 name of the Voyagers' Club impressed her 
 curiously in connection with Fidelia's fears 
 for her wandering father, and something 
 ominous became present to her mind. 
 
 ' Did this gentleman,' she said to the girl 
 in a low tone, ' ask to see me — ^in the first 
 instance ? ' 
 
 'Yes, Lady Scardale. He asked if Miss 
 Locke were here — and I told him she 
 was — and then he asked if he might see 
 you. He said he would rather see you 
 first.' 
 
 ' It is as I thought,' Lady Scardale said to 
 
 N 2
 
 i8o RED DIAMONDS 
 
 herself Then she turned to the little group 
 around her and said : 
 
 'I shall be back in a few minutes, I hope,' 
 and she followed the girl into the house and 
 into her own study, where Gerald Aspen was 
 waiting for her. 
 
 Lady Scardale was absent rather longer 
 than she expected to be. She did not come 
 back to the garden for more than a quarter 
 of an hour, and when she did come she did 
 not return alone. Gerald Aspen was by her 
 side. Lady Scardale looked very grave and 
 sad, and Gerald looked grave and sad too. 
 ,He had just told Lady Scardale the strange 
 story with which he had become acquainted 
 that morning, and Lady Scardale had decided 
 that he himself had better tell it to Fidelia. 
 Lady Scardale looked around for Fidelia, and 
 saw her in a distant part of the garden, talking 
 to some of the visitors. The garden was
 
 THE CULTURE COLLEGE i8i 
 
 almost empty now, for it was growing chill, 
 and most of the guests had gone indoors or 
 departed. 
 
 'Wait here a moment,' Lady Scardale said 
 to Gerald, who bowed silently. Then she 
 walked rapidly across the grass to where 
 Fidelia was standing. 
 
 • Fidelia,' said Lady Scardale softly, ' I 
 want to speak to you.' 
 
 The people to whom Fidelia was talking 
 said good-bye, and shook hands and departed. 
 Lady Scardale and Fideha were left alone. 
 Fidelia knew by Lady Scardale's manner that 
 she had something serious to say, and her 
 heart began to beat quickly, for she felt sure 
 that it must be on the one subject which 
 occupied her mind. 
 
 ' Fidelia,' said Lady Scardale, ' I have sad 
 news — I don't believe in trying to break the 
 fall or soften the pain of such news.'
 
 i82 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 She took Fidelia's hands in hers and pressed 
 them tenderly. 
 
 Fideha looked at her through eyes swim- 
 ming in sudden tears. 
 
 ' My father,' she said. ' He is dead ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, dear,' said Lady Scardale. ' He is 
 dead.' 
 
 ' How do you know ? ' 
 
 ' There is a young man here,' Lady Scar- 
 dale answered, ' who has just told me ; his is 
 a strange story altogether. Are you strong 
 enough to hear it now, or would you rather 
 wait until some other time ? ' 
 
 * No, no,' Fidelia answered firmly. ' I 
 would rather hear it now.' 
 
 Lady Scardale turned and made a sign to 
 Gerald. He had stood where she left him, 
 watching them and wondering at the strange 
 chance which had thrown him so suddenly into 
 confidential relationship with the two women
 
 THE CULTURE COLLEGE 183 
 
 he had seen for the first time on the previous 
 night. He obeyed Lady Scardale's signal, 
 and joined the two women. 
 
 ' Fideha,' said Lady Scardale, ' this is Mr. 
 Gerald Aspen, who has some sad and strange 
 news for you. Mr. Aspen, this is Miss 
 Locke.' 
 
 Gerald bowed. If the girl had looked 
 beautiful last night, smiling in the darkness, 
 she was more beautiful now in the clear even- 
 ing Hght, though her face was so intensely sad. 
 
 ' Sit down, Fidelia, while Mr. Aspen tells 
 you his story.' And Lady Scardale led 
 Fideha to a garden-seat, under an old 
 elm. ' There, I will leave you for the present. 
 I shall be back again directly.' 
 
 Lady Scardale moved away to take fare- 
 well of the last departing guests. Fidelia 
 looked up at Gerald. 
 
 ' Tell me about my father,' she said.
 
 i84 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 Looking down at her, Gerald told her all 
 the strange story, the fairy tale which he had 
 learned that day from the pocket-book, and 
 which so mysteriously brought together her 
 name and his. He told her of the murder of 
 Seth Chickering, of her father's death, and his 
 father's death, and of the fortunes that were 
 so strangely bequeathed to her and him. 
 
 She hardly listened to the few words in 
 which he told that part of the story. 
 
 ' I knew my father was dead.' She rose 
 and stood, white and rigid as a statue. 
 
 ' Need I tell you how much I feel for you, 
 Miss Locke ? ' 
 
 ' Sir, I feel for you,' Fidelia said, with her 
 eyes swimming in tears. ' If I have lost a 
 father you have lost a father too.' 
 
 She held out her hand in simple, girlish 
 sympathy. Gerald took it for a moment in 
 his. Ee would gladly have raised it to his
 
 THE CULTURE COLLEGE 185 
 
 lips in the graceful fashion of another time, 
 
 but he shrank from the semblance of making 
 
 too free with the girl in her distress. He saw 
 
 that she was shaken to the very centre of her 
 
 life. He gently pressed her hand and then 
 
 withdrew his own. Her suffering sanctified 
 
 her in his eyes. Even modern journaHsm by 
 
 no means takes the chivalry out of a man. 
 
 He felt deeply for her, and it seemed to him a 
 
 kind of hypocrisy to liken his sorrow to hers. 
 
 He had known nothing of his father, who had 
 
 indeed never been over much of a family man, 
 
 and had left his son to do the battle of life on 
 
 his own account. 
 
 Was it not the father of the Black Prince 
 who refused to send more troops to his son's 
 aid, declaring it would be better for his son 
 to win the battle entirely off his own bat ? 
 Perhaps this was the heroic view of his 
 paternal duty taken by Mr. Aspen senior also.
 
 1 86 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 Anyhow, lie left his son to make the best 
 battle he could, unencumbered by any help 
 from a father's hand. It may have been 
 a well-meant and even heroic policy, but it is 
 certainly not the sort of policy which is likely 
 to endear a father to his son. 
 
 So Gerald did not believe in his inmost 
 heart that he felt the loss of his father as 
 Miss Locke felt the loss of hers. Therefore 
 her words of sympathetic companionship 
 made him feel almost ashamed. 
 
 ' I knew very Httle of my father,' he said 
 frankly — not without an effort, for it seemed 
 like a censure on the memory of the dead. 
 
 ' My father was always with me while we 
 were at home,' Fidelia said. ' I adored him. 
 Well, I must pray to God to give me strength. 
 You have not told me yet, Mr. Aspen ' — she 
 had got his name already — ' what he ' — her 
 voice choked — ' what he died of.'
 
 THE CULTURE COLLEGE 187 
 
 ' Can you have courage, Miss Locke ? ' the 
 young man asked, in tones as tremulous and 
 with cheek as blanched as if he himself had 
 done the deed it was now his cruel duty to 
 announce. ' I have to tell you the worst.' 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 ' The worst was told,' she said, ' when I 
 learned that my father is dead — that he will 
 never, never come home to me any more. 
 Nothing to be told after that can affect my 
 courage or my power of endurance.' 
 
 ' Yet it is horrible to have to tell you. 
 Miss Locke, your father was killed. Stop — I 
 said " killed," not murdered.' 
 
 She had involuntarily given vent to a 
 little scream, and put up her hands nervously 
 before her face, as if to ward off the wings of 
 some odious calamity that was coming to 
 beat her down. Her father was killed ! 
 There was no need for him to die. Xo
 
 i88 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 disease had caught hold of him — no inevit- 
 able fate had stricken him down. He might 
 have lived — and someone had killed him ! 
 Now she felt that she had not exhausted her 
 limits of suffering even when she heard of her 
 father's death. It was added horror, and 
 horror unspeakable, to think that some brutal 
 hand had killed him. An English girl thinks 
 of death, even to those she loves most fondly, 
 as some unavoidable fate coming gently on 
 the victim in the sweet, quiet, stilled presence 
 of those who watch in devotion and grief 
 around the death-bed. She does not think of 
 a death by violence — a death by some cruel 
 human hand which might have spared and 
 did not ; a death by violence — with blows 
 and a hideous wound — a death desecrated — a 
 hfe cut off in the wantonness of brutal enmity 
 and hatred. 
 
 ' Oh, this is too terrible,' she murmured.
 
 THE CULTURE COLLEGE 189 
 
 ^ I never thought of that ! ' Then she said, 
 with something positively fierce in her tone 
 and the look of her gleaming eyes : ' Tell me, 
 Mr. Aspen, and don't spare me, please — tell 
 me who murdered my father.' 
 
 * I have not said that he was murdered — I 
 dare not say that yet — I hope and believe it 
 was not so.' 
 
 ' He was murdered ! ' she exclaimed. ' He 
 was gentle, he was kind, he was only too 
 tender-hearted — he could not have been 
 killed unless by an accident, or by murder, 
 murder, murder ! Was it an accident ? You 
 do not try to deceive me by pretending that 
 it was.' 
 
 ' It was not an accident. Miss Locke. It 
 was in a quarrel, I beheve.' 
 
 ' My father never quarrelled ; he was too 
 noble, and generous, and gentle. Do you 
 think I do not know my father? He was
 
 I90 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 murdered ; now tell me who murdered 
 him.' 
 
 In all his embarrassment and pain Gerald 
 could not help feeling an almost impassioned 
 admiration for the girl who stood now in so 
 brave and splendid an attitude of resolve. 
 She appeared to have suddenly changed her 
 nature. She was strong, bold, resolute — 
 filled with the temper of set purpose, and, it is 
 to be feared, the spirit of vengeance. 
 
 ' Let us sit down, Mr. Aspen,' she said. 
 'Now tell me all about it.' 
 
 Gerald told her all that he knew. She 
 flinched from nothing, and neither did he now. 
 He gave her all the reasons, all the hopes he 
 could, for the belief that Captain Locke had 
 been killed in one of the fights so common in 
 that region. The girl hstened quietly. Then 
 she began to ask him many questions about 
 the man who made such a strange and sudden
 
 THE CULTURE COLLEGE 191 
 
 appearance on the scene of the murder — the 
 man who called himself Eandolph, or rather 
 Eatt, Gundy. 
 
 ' Something about him haunts me,' she 
 said. ' I can't make it out, but there is some- 
 thing which makes me turn cold when I hear 
 of him. Had he nothing to do with the 
 murder, do you think ? ' 
 
 ' The murder in St. James's Street ? ' 
 
 * Yes — you won't admit, as yet, that there 
 was any other murder — that my father was 
 murdered.' 
 
 What a change a few moments had made 
 in her ! She talked now calmly, coldly, of her 
 father's death. 
 
 'Everyone says there was no evidence of 
 
 the remotest kind against this man — this 
 
 <_ 
 
 stranger — except the fact that he was found 
 beside the dead body. But, indeed, it is not 
 quite fair to him to say he was found there ;
 
 192 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 it was he who gave the alarm and summoned 
 the police.' 
 
 ' Is that his real name, do you think ? ' 
 
 'No, I am sure it is not. A man sel- 
 dom goes by a real name out in those 
 places.' 
 
 ' I want to see that man,' she said ; ' I 
 want to know him. Will you help me ? ' 
 
 ' I will help you in every way I can. I 
 will do anything to help you, but I do not 
 understand why you should want to see that 
 man.' 
 
 ' For one thing, Mr. Aspen ; because he is 
 the only man now in England who knows 
 anything of all this story — 1 mean from 
 personal knowledge. He must be able to tell 
 me something about — about my father. And 
 I should like to see him — face to face. I 
 should know better what to think if I had 
 seen him.'
 
 THE CULTURE COLLEGE 193 
 
 ' Of course,' Gerald said, hesitatingly, ' I 
 will do all I can.' 
 
 ' Will you help me to see this man ? ' 
 He was a httle surprised at her eagerness, 
 but he only answered, ' Oh yes — if I can.' 
 
 ' If you can ! Why — are you not involved 
 in the whole story as well as I ? Is not your 
 father dead out there as well as mine ? Can't 
 you go and see him and talk to him P Would 
 not that be the natural thing to do ? ' 
 
 ' It would, certainly,' Gerald said . ' I must 
 see him in any case, and of course, if you 
 wish to see him it shall be made easy for you. 
 ' Thank you, very much', she said, with 
 suddenly down-dropped eyes. 
 
 Why had Gerald rather evaded her wish 
 to see this extraordinary Mr. Eatt Gundy? 
 Partly perhaps out of a natural and manly 
 reluctance to see that bright pure creature 
 brought into any manner of relationship with 
 
 VOL. I. O
 
 194 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 such a cosmopolitan adventurer as the so- 
 called Eatt Gundy. Gerald had met Eatt 
 Gundy in Scotland Yard ; Gerald had very 
 chivalrous, almost Quixotic notions about 
 women and the fittingness of their segregation 
 from all that was tainted and rowdy in man- 
 hood — notions for which, be it observed, 
 womanhood in general would not perhaps 
 always thank him. And then, too, deep down in 
 the depths of his heart was a jealous feeling 
 that Gundy was a very handsome, dashing, 
 dare devil sort of fellow, who had a winning 
 voice, a bright smile, and a voluble tongue, 
 and that it was quite possible to fancy that a 
 girl might be charmed by him. Gerald had 
 spoken to Miss Locke for the first time in his 
 life ; he had not been talking to her for much 
 more than a quarter of an hour, and already, 
 in truly masculine fashion, he began to dislike 
 instinctively the idea of other men coming
 
 THE CULTURE COLLEGE 
 
 95 
 
 near her. For he said to himself, ' Destiny 
 must have had some purpose in bringing us 
 so strangely together.' 
 
 ' One word,' he said, as he was going, and 
 after they had arranged that he was to see 
 her or to communicate with her again on this 
 wholly sad subject ; 'you know that you are 
 now rich — at least that a great sum of money 
 is coming to you, and will be yours next 
 January ? ' 
 
 ' Yes ; you have made that clear to me. 
 Thank you, ever so much. I am so glad — so 
 dehghted — so enchanted ! ' 
 
 Her eyes sparkled with a curious flashing 
 light of triumph. 
 
 Gerald was surprised. ' Is she then like so 
 many others — hke all the rest ? ' he asked 
 himself ' Can she, too, be consoled for any 
 loss by a compensation in money ? ' 
 
 ' You are glad ? ' he stammered. ' Oh well, 
 
 o2
 
 196 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 and naturally, of course. I suppose everyone 
 must be glad to get money.' 
 
 ' Naturally, of course,' she repeated, ' if 
 one wants to do something. Everyone says 
 that nothing can be done without money. 
 Very well, I will use that money to find out 
 all about my father's death and to bring his 
 murderer to justice. I will go out to those 
 diamond fields myself if it be necessary — but it 
 will not, I know it will not. I shall spend my 
 money here. My money and all I own — to my 
 last gown, to my health, to my life — all, all 
 shall be given up from this moment to the 
 task of finding out my father's murderer ! ' 
 
 She took leave of Gerald with a sort of 
 patronising air. There was something stately 
 and serene about her. She sent him away 
 with kindly superiority, as an exiled princess 
 might have done. When he first came within 
 sight of her, not very many minutes ago, she
 
 THE CULTURE COLLEGE 197 
 
 had seemed to him only a beautiful delicate 
 girl, whom a stroke of sad news might have 
 borne to the earth like a tall swaying flower 
 under a sharp and sudden hailstorm. Now 
 she seemed self-contained, strong and stately, 
 able to stand upright and alone against any 
 shock. Her resolve sustained her. Her pur' 
 pose had made her strong. She was a woman- 
 Orestes ; she had to find out the truth about 
 a parent's death and bring the slayer to 
 justice. 
 
 Gerald Aspen had a good deal to think 
 about as he sat in the little niche of the 
 Voyagers' Club that night. The whole aspect 
 of life had undergone a change for him, too, as 
 well as for her.
 
 198 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 CHAPTEE X 
 
 A NINE days' wonder 
 
 An inquest is at the best of times a 
 depressing performance, but it is especially so 
 under the conditions which attended that 
 upon the body of poor Seth Chickering. 
 Here was a man — a stranger — suddenly 
 struck down in the very heart of London, on 
 the very night of his arrival, by an assassin's 
 hand — and struck down, too, in no obscure 
 corner, no hideous backwater of human life 
 in the purlieus of the East End, but in the 
 very centre of London's fashionable existence, 
 in the neighbourhood of one of London's most 
 famous streets. There was something so 
 terrible, so mysterious, so mahgnant about
 
 A NINE DAYS' WONDER 199 
 
 the deed that it passed at once from the 
 category of ordinary crimes. Only one 
 person came forward after the event was 
 made piibhc who was able to give any fresh 
 information to the jury. This was a man 
 who crave his name as James Bostock, whose 
 business in life was that of a teacher of 
 fencing, and who was employed in that 
 capacity at the Culture College, Chelsea. He 
 had not, however, very much information to 
 give. All that he had to say was that on the 
 evening of the crime he was coming from St. 
 James's Park in the direction of Piccadilly. 
 Just as he was crossing the carriage-road 
 between the Park and the Palace a man ran 
 against him — a man who was going at full 
 speed, and who seemed to be under the influence 
 of great excitement. Mr. Bostock said that he 
 was able to see the man's face very plainly, 
 and he described it in terms which corre-
 
 200 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 sponded very closely with the description 
 given by Gundy. The man who ran against 
 Mr. Bostock had, like the man who ran 
 against Mr. Gundy, a mass of red hair, and 
 the lower part of his face was almost con- 
 cealed by a large red beard. One other par- 
 ticular Mr. Bostock was able, however, to add. 
 He declared that when the man came to a 
 momentary halt, after running up against 
 him, he broke out into some angry utterance, 
 the meaning of which Mr. Bostock did not 
 understand, as it was in a language unfamihar 
 to him. Being further questioned, he said he 
 was perfectly sure that it was neither French, 
 German, Italian, nor Spanish, as he himself 
 was fairly well acquainted with all those 
 languages, and that what the man said was 
 sufficiently long to have allowed him time to 
 follow it if it had been in any tongue of which 
 he knew anything. One of the jury, whose
 
 A NINE DAYS' WONDER 201 
 
 mind seemed to be running on Nihilism, 
 suggested tliat perhaps it might have been 
 Eussian. Mr. Bostock agreed that perhaps it 
 might have been Eussian. The coroner 
 observed that there were many outlandish 
 tongues talked in Europe as well as Eussian. 
 There was Turkish, for example, and Greek. 
 Mr. Gundy thereupon pleasantly suggested 
 that there was Magyar, Eoumanian, Bulgarian, 
 Polish, and the like, not to mention Eomany, 
 which was largely talked in all parts of 
 Europe. Mr. Bostock said, ' Very likely,' but 
 he didn't know any of those tongues. There 
 was evidently nothing further to be got out of 
 him, and he was allowed to retire after the 
 coroner had duly thanked him for his sense of 
 public duty in coming forward as he had 
 done. 
 
 The coroner's jury could find no other 
 verdict in the case of poor Chickering than
 
 202 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 that of ' Wilful murder against some person or 
 persons unknown.' There was nothing to 
 be got out of Eatt Gundy — as he called 
 himself — beyond his original story. He had 
 seen Seth Chickering in St. James's Square 
 shortly after Chickering came out of the 
 Voyagers' Club — he had followed him a little, 
 thinkincr the fiofure famihar to him, and the 
 figure disappeared near a court leading out 
 of St. James's Street. Eatt was looking down 
 the court when he heard a cry and the sound 
 of some sort of scuffle — he was run against 
 suddenly by a man who was running with all 
 his speed and who nearly knocked him over. 
 Eatt flung him contemptuously aside, he said, 
 but he thought of nothincr more serious than 
 a drunken row. He went down the court, 
 however, and there he found Seth Chickering 
 dead. Many people thought the story sus- 
 picious, but there was nothing clear to be
 
 A NINE DAYS' WONDER 203 
 
 said against it. Gundy was able to make it 
 plain enough that he had credit for a large 
 amount on one of the great banking-houses, 
 and that he had made arrangements for a 
 lengthened stay in London. There was no 
 evidence whatever ao-ainst him. He stated 
 that he had not been in London for years. 
 There was nothing to do but to let him go his 
 way. He blandly assured the coroner that 
 he should not be out of the way for some 
 time — that he meant to enjoy himself a little 
 in London. 
 
 An interviewer, not from the ' Catapult,' 
 called on him at the Berkeley Hotel. He was 
 entirely affable and even more than affable. 
 He had up a bottle of champagne and some 
 cura9oa, and he made a surprising blend out 
 of the two. He produced some almost divine 
 Havana cigars, and he made it a condition 
 of the interview that the interviewer should
 
 204 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 smoke and drink. Having the interests of his 
 profession and his paper close at heart the 
 interviewer accepted the basis of negotiations. 
 The story was soon over the whole town. 
 It flew, rumour-wafted, from one quarter to 
 another. The tale of the great diamond find 
 alone would have been marvellous enough to 
 keep the town going for three out of the 
 proverbial nine days at least — the story of the 
 wondrous mine and the strange bond of 
 partnership and the wealth to be poured in 
 upon wholly unexpecting creatures. But 
 then came on the top of it all the mysterious 
 murder of poor Chickering — the man who 
 had brought home the good news, the man 
 who had brought home the names and 
 evidences by which to find out the heirs — 
 and there was he murdered on the very first 
 night of his arrival in London, and no hint or 
 trace of the murderer could be found !
 
 A NINE DAYS' WONDER 205 
 
 When people had time to think of any- 
 thing but the murder they talked of the 
 beautiful girl who was associated with Lady 
 Scardale — ' eccentric Lady Scardale, don't you 
 know ? ' — in the Chelsea Culture College, and 
 who had now suddenly become a great heiress. 
 The society papers were studded with para- 
 graphs about FideUa Locke, and some of the 
 illustrated journals published photographs of 
 her. The ' Catapult ' made a great affair of 
 it, for Gerald Aspen interviewed himself and 
 set forth his own version of the storv at 
 great length and with an easily-acquired 
 clearness — the clearness of one who knows all 
 about it. 
 
 But Gerald had many feeUngs in his own 
 mind to which he did not give the slightest 
 utterance in print. That was one reason why 
 he interviewed himself for the ' Catapult ' and 
 allowed no one to interview him for any other
 
 2o6 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 paper. He was tliiis secure against being 
 asked and having to evade questions which 
 he did not choose to answer. 
 
 There was one great question which he 
 always kept asking himself, and to which as 
 yet he could find even in conjecture no 
 manner of answer. Who knew of Chickering's 
 coming to London, and who had an interest 
 in Chickering's death ? For that Chickering 
 was the victim of a mere robbery or a chance 
 murder Gerald could not bring himself to 
 believe. 
 
 The whole of the property was in the 
 hands of respectable lawyers at the Cape. It 
 was estimated, in a note in Seth Chickering's 
 handwriting, at about a million sterhng, and 
 it subsequently proved to be rather more than 
 this. Seth Chickering's death had increased 
 the common stock in diminishing the number 
 of sharers, so that every one of the persons.
 
 A NINE BAYS' WONDER 207 
 
 either heirs or partners, would corae in for a 
 succession of something slightly over two 
 hundred thousand pounds. 
 
 The story naturally excited the greatest 
 interest in London for the proverbial nine days. 
 Everything about the business, from the origi- 
 nal eccentric contract to the mysterious murder 
 of Seth Chickering, and the extraordinary dis- 
 covery with regard to the heirs, was so 
 attractive to a public that delights in stimu- 
 lating novelties, that for at least a week little 
 else was talked about or written about except 
 the story of the Bluewater Diamond Mine. 
 Domestic politics, foreign politics, a society 
 scandal, a divorce case, and a new play com- 
 peted in vain for a glance of public favour. 
 The Bluewater Diamond Mine, the murder of 
 Seth Chickering, the heritage of Gerald Aspen, 
 and the evidence of Eatt Gundy were the 
 themes of the time, and until the freshness of
 
 2o8 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 those themes was exhausted, httle else had a 
 chance of serious consideration. People talked 
 it over on the tops of omnibuses, and in fash- 
 ionable drawing-rooms, in the smoking-rooms 
 of clubs, and at corner coffee-stalls. It was 
 discussed in all its bearings by all the journals, 
 and ingenious people rushed into print with 
 all manner of explanations of all the per- 
 plexing points in the affair, explanations in 
 every case evolved entirely from their own 
 moral consciousness, and based upon no know 
 ledge whatever either of the persons concerned 
 or of the Cape, or even of diamonds. 
 
 There was, of course, no difficulty about 
 finding most of the heirs. Gerald Aspen was 
 the producer of the pocket-book ; Eatt Gundy 
 had almost witnessed the murder. The 
 Honourable John Eaven, the Secretary of 
 tlie Voyagers' Club, the Captain Jackdaw of 
 his friends, came forward at once. His elder
 
 A NINE DAYS' WONDER 209 
 
 brother, Lord Wallington's second son, had 
 disappeared long ago, no one knew where, 
 and no one very much cared. Captain Jack" 
 daw assumed that he had left his money to 
 him. Jackdaw, more to annoy his eldest brother 
 and his father than out of any affection for 
 him, the younger brother. However, they 
 had been friends to a degree rather remarkable 
 among the Eavens, and in any case Captain 
 Jackdaw, who was desperately hard up, was 
 delighted to enter into his inheritance, and 
 very little disposed to quarrel with the destiny 
 which had brought it about. 
 
 ' Poor old Percy — good old Percy ! ' he 
 said. ' Wonder who shot him. Eoughish lot 
 in those places. Must have been from behind 
 though, for Percy was a good plucked 'un. 
 Yes, I'm sorry for Percy, but I'm deuced glad 
 to get the oof.' 
 
 And if Captain Jackdaw was glad so were 
 VOL. I. p
 
 2IO RED DIAMONDS 
 
 a great number of persons to whom Captain 
 Jackdaw owed money. 
 
 Eatt Gundy explained himself. The word 
 ' vamosed ' implied that he had gone away. 
 So he had. He had joined the association 
 when he was at the Cape, had put his share of 
 money into it and done his share of work, and 
 then had got tired of the whole thing, and, as 
 he gracefully expressed it, had turned it up 
 and started to South America to join in a fight 
 that was going on in one of the turbulent 
 Eepublics. He had just come to England 
 after a series of adventures in the Eepublic, 
 which had nearly ended in his being shot by 
 one party, and which actually ended in his 
 receiving the title of General from the other 
 and the finally victorious party. By the terms 
 of the agreement he was entitled to his share 
 in spite of his retirement, and he might very 
 likely have gone ofi' to the Cape again to look
 
 A NINE DAYS' WONDER 211 
 
 after the Bluewater ]\Iine and his comrades but 
 for the unexpected event which now made 
 such an expedition useless. 
 
 As for the daughter of Captain Locke 
 there was no difficulty in finding her. Lady 
 Scardale was well known in London, and 
 everyone who knew Lady Scardale personally 
 knew of her friendship for Miss Fidelia 
 Locke. 
 
 The only remaining heir was Japhet 
 Bland. An advertisement was put into all 
 the newspapers, calling upon him to come 
 forward, but no answer was returned to the 
 appeal. 
 
 Few stranger things can readily happen 
 to a young man than to be raised suddenly 
 from a position of comparative poverty to one 
 which promises positive wealth. At the first 
 blush Gerald did not rightly realise, did not 
 even try to reaUse, his new position. The 
 
 p 2
 
 212 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 thiDg was all so sudden, it had all come in 
 such a rush. Moreover, though he was thus 
 unexpectedly made the heir to considerable 
 riches, though he was nominally the master of 
 a fortune such as had seemed as far beyond 
 his dreams as the Koh-i-Noor itself, he was 
 not yet actually in possession of his property. 
 There were formalities to be gone through, 
 legal conditions to be fulfilled, twenty trifling 
 necessary acts to be accomplished, and above 
 all there was the first day of the next January 
 to be reached, before Gerald would, in what 
 may be called the physical sense, be the pro- 
 prietor of his legacy, and free to do with it as 
 he pleased. The time and the formalities 
 would indeed be soon over ; but still Gerald 
 did not fully recognise that he was to be a 
 rich man. 
 
 He began gradually to recognise it, how- 
 ever. He had never been of a mercenary
 
 A NINE DAYS' WONDER 
 
 213 
 
 turn, he had never coveted money, or the 
 things that money can give, in any mean way. 
 But he was a young man very well capable of 
 enjoying himself, and perfectly well aware 
 that, other things being equal, the young man 
 with many thousands a year has a far better 
 chance of enjoying himself than the young 
 man with only a few hundreds a year. But 
 Gerald had been very content, had been 
 almost happy on his few hundreds a year. He 
 earned them himself by doing work which he 
 hked very much to do. He was exceedingly 
 proud of being a journahst, and exceedingly 
 pleased with the ' Catapult,' and he hked the 
 bustling, varied, endlessly changeful London 
 life of which his duties showed him so much. 
 His httle eyrie on the Embankment, his fellow- 
 ship at the Voyagers', his attitude of a keenly 
 interested spectator and dexterous commen- 
 tator upon the big game of Hfe that was being
 
 214 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 played all around him — these things had so 
 far filled the measure of his modest ambitions 
 and gratified his desires. 
 
 Now, of course, all was in a measure 
 changed. His former liking for his work had 
 been an excellent thing, for it had enabled 
 him to do that work better, and had given 
 him pleasure as well as profit. But now he 
 need not work again unless he chose ; he had 
 nothing to work for. So far as the great 
 endless human question of food by day and 
 sleep by night and raiment to cover him went, 
 he never need distress himself again. These, 
 the great wants of man — as Schopenhauer 
 told him — were comfortably arranged for by 
 a father who had left him to shift foi himself 
 since he was a child. 
 
 Human happiness, he remembered once 
 reading in Schopenhauer when he was work- 
 ing up an article for the ' Catapult,' was
 
 A NINE DAYS' WONDER 215 
 
 simply based upon health, food, protection 
 from wet and cold. 
 
 Well, he had had so much all his life so 
 far, and his new-found fortune could not 
 gravely increase the sum of his happiness if 
 these were all. 
 
 ' But were these all ? ' he kept asking him- 
 self now, as he mused in his Embankment 
 watch tower while the blue grey smoke- 
 clouds floated from his pipe out far across 
 the river, and his thoughts floated with them 
 into the future and its new possibilities. 
 
 Gerald was not a man to whom the merely 
 physical side of life appealed pre-eminently 
 He was not an ascetic, and he was willing 
 enough to ' let no flower of the spring go by 
 him ' ; but he was no sensualist, and in his 
 dreams of the disposition of his treasure the 
 thoughts of mere satisfaction of the senses played 
 little or no part. It scarcely occurred to him,
 
 2i6 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 or occurred to him merely as a slight factor 
 in the problem, that he could now afibrd to 
 dress better, to drink costlier wines, to live as 
 well as the most epicurean of the Yoyagers ; 
 that he had at his absolute command many 
 of the things that would appear exceedingly 
 precious and exceeding pleasant to most 
 young men who found themselves suddenly 
 rich beyond their dreams. 
 
 Indeed, Gerald was too bewildered by his 
 good fortune, when he at all tried to realise it, 
 to form any very precise idea as to the course 
 of his new life. It was so astonishing to think 
 that many things which he had desired to 
 do, and which had seemed as impossible as 
 Astolfo's voyage to the moon, would soon be 
 at his absolute command for no more pains 
 than the signing of his name to an oblong 
 strip of paper. It was more astonishing still 
 to find that now, when he had all these desires
 
 A NINE DAYS' WONDER 217 
 
 and desirable things within his grasp, how very 
 few of them he seemed to be immediately in 
 need of. He had wished for them in a vague 
 way, as one wishes for sunhght on a wet day, 
 but now that they were placed within his 
 grasp he scarcely felt that he wanted to 
 stretch out his hand and take them. This 
 mood would change he knew in his heart of 
 hearts ; he would soon realise his position and 
 its conditions ; but for the moment it seemed 
 to him that his old condition was one of 
 excellent content, and that there was something 
 at once frightening and irritating about his 
 inheritance. He did not want to leave the 
 ' Catapult ' ; he was very happy with the 
 ' Catapult.' And then it flashed across his 
 mind that he could, if he chose, make the 
 ' Catapult ' his own, and the thought seemed to 
 him so whimsical, so suggestive of the private 
 soldier who is suddenly called upon to be 
 commander-in-chief, that he laughed aloud.
 
 2i8 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 CHAPTEE XI 
 
 AN INTEEVIEW WITH MR. RATT GUNDY 
 
 The ' Moonbeam,' a sort of upstart and pre- 
 tentious rival of the ' Catapult,' one evening 
 came out with an elaborate and amazing report 
 of an interview with Mr. Eandolph, or, as he 
 preferred to call himself, Eatt Gundy. The 
 report began by saying he had removed from 
 the Berkeley Hotel into elegant bachelor 
 apartments in St. James's Place, St. James's 
 Square. The representative of the ' Moon- 
 beam ' was shown into one of the most 
 elegant of these apartments by the Bedouin 
 attendant, who watched over the outer doors. 
 He was then consigned to the charge of Mr. 
 Gundy's Arab servant. He was received with
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR. RATT GUNDY 219 
 
 the greatest courtesy, and was left for a while 
 to meditate among the interesting collection of 
 objects which told of Mr. Gundy's taste for 
 foreign travel, sport and adventure. All 
 manner of weapons of chase were there, and 
 tiger skins, alligator hides, the antlers of 
 various kinds of deer, the skin of the grizzly 
 bear, and the teeth of the alligator. There 
 was a grand piano and there was a banjo, and 
 hkewise a light guitar, suggesting, as the 
 poetic interviewer said, tender reminiscences 
 of soft, summer nights under some balcony in 
 Madrid or Seville. Mr. Gundy evidently 
 dabbled in the pictorial arts as well, for the 
 walls were ornamented with marvellously 
 artistic etchings and ' silver-points,' which 
 bore the initials of E. G. Plainly Mr. Gundy 
 had varied tastes and gifts, for on the piano- 
 stand and on the piano itself were lying several 
 scraps of music bearing the announcement,
 
 220 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 ' Words and music by Eatt Gundy.' On a 
 large table was displayed a magnilicent 
 sword of honour with jewelled hilt, which 
 bore an enamelled inscription, traced in Greek 
 character and words along its blade, ' Presented 
 to Colonel Eatt Gundy by the patriots of 
 Crete in gratitude for his l^rilliant services as 
 a leader of Volunteers in their cause against 
 the Moslem oppressor.' Near the sword lay a 
 superb revolver with gold mounting, and a 
 scroll on the o-old mounting made known that 
 the revolver was the gift of Emin Pasha ' to 
 his one true friend and companion-in-arms, 
 Captain Eatt Gundy.' 
 
 Some of the pictures on the walls were 
 those of beautiful women in foreign garb — all 
 made further precious by presentation auto- 
 graphs from the fair beings whose lovely 
 lineaments they portrayed. Stuffed birds 
 made up an important part of the room's
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR. RATT GUNDY 221 
 
 decoration. Among these was an immense 
 creature measurincr seventeen feet from wincr- 
 tip to wing-tip, and this the interviewer was 
 informed was ' The celebrated Eukh or Eoc,' 
 of which so much has been read in the Arabian 
 Nights, which indeed was long held to be a 
 creature of fabulous birth or existence until 
 the genius and enterprise of Captain Eatt 
 Gundy discovered its reahty and its genuine 
 haunts. 
 
 So much of the ' Moonbeam's ' interview 
 had been read with utter amazement by 
 Gerald Aspen. He was reading the paper in 
 the famihar smoking niche of the Voyagers' 
 Club. Curiously enough his companion was 
 Eatt Gundy himself. Gerald had followed up 
 Miss Locke's request by seeking and making 
 the acquaintance of Mr. Gundy, and he had 
 brought him to dine at the Voyagers' Club. 
 They had dined at the very same table where
 
 222 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 poor Seth Chickering dined — Gundy was now 
 sitting in the chair where Seth Chickering sat 
 just before he went out on that walk home- 
 ward which he never completed. Gerald had 
 not yet begun to explain all this gloomy busi- 
 ness to Gundy — although he meant to do it — 
 but as they were lighting their cigarettes 
 his eye fell on the ' Moonbeam ' and the big 
 capitals announcing the interview with Mr. 
 Gundy, and he could not help reading on a 
 little way. Then he looked up in some sur- 
 prise. 
 
 ' Hallo ! I say, you promised me the first 
 interview for the " Catapult," you know,' 
 Gerald said, distractedly. 
 
 Gundy was smoking a big, thick, full- 
 flavoured, able-bodied Havana cigar, which he 
 had taken from his own case. A new twinkle 
 came into his bright, falcon-like eyes as they 
 glanced at the copy of the ' Moonbeam ' which
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR. RATT GUNDY 223 
 
 Gerald was holding out reproachfully towards 
 him. 
 
 ' Promised you the first interview for the 
 " Catapult " ? Why, certainly, so I did And 
 so you shall have it, my boy.' 
 
 'Yes, but look here; what do you call 
 that — that thincf in the '* Moonbeam " ? ' 
 
 ' That ? Why, that's all rot, you know.' 
 
 ' Yes, but how did they get it ? Did you 
 authorise it ? ' 
 
 ' Well, yes — in a manner — yes.' 
 
 'Did you see anyone from the "Moon> 
 beam " ? ' 
 
 ' Give you my word, dear boy, I never 
 saw anyone from the " Moonbeam." ' 
 
 ' Did they write to you ? ' 
 
 * Oh yes, they did.' 
 
 ' What did they ask for ? ' 
 
 'Well, of course, they asked for an inter- 
 view.'
 
 224 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 ' And you said ? ' 
 
 'Well, in fact, I said I was too much 
 engaged — but that my secretary would write 
 them out the sort of thing I thought they 
 would probably like to have.' 
 
 ' Then your secretary wrote all that glow- 
 ing account of you and your rooms, and your 
 works of art, and your presentation revolvers 
 and swords of honour, and all the rest of 
 it?' 
 
 ' Not he — never wrote a line of it. There 
 is the best possible reason why he couldn't 
 have written a line of it.' 
 
 ' Yes — what reason ? ' 
 
 ' Why, because, to begin with, there is no 
 such person in existence. I haven't any 
 secretary. Do you want to know any other 
 of the many, indeed the innumerable, reasons 
 why my secretary could not have written
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR. RATT GUNDY 225 
 
 that account of the wholly imaginary inter- 
 view ? ' 
 
 ' No,' said Gerald, with a laugh. ' I think 
 his non-existence is reason enough for me 
 — although I don't say, by any means, that it 
 would convince all our present day controver- 
 sialists. But who wrote the description, 
 then ? ' 
 
 ' Can't you guess ? ' 
 
 ' Not the least in the world.' 
 
 * Why, of course, / did. Didn't I do it 
 well? Haven't I got what your newspaper 
 people would call a graphic style ? Graphic 
 — isn't that the right word in the right 
 place ? ' 
 
 ' Yes — I admit the peculiar merits of your 
 style,' Gerald said, still a little annoyed. * But 
 you certainly promised me the first go in 
 — and you always boast to be a man of your 
 word.' 
 
 VOL. I. Q
 
 226 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 ' So I am, dear boy, so I am — so you will 
 always find me. I have broken lots of laws 
 and codes and I don't know what in my time, 
 but never my own code — never my own word. 
 A man's word ought to be his bond, they say. 
 By Jove ! my bond is my word.' 
 
 ' But I can't now have the first interview.' 
 ' Why not ? Here I am, ask me anything 
 you Hke — interview away — go ahead.' 
 ' But the description of your rooms ? ' 
 ' All right, ask me all about them.' 
 ' Why, they are already described in the 
 " Moonbeam." ' 
 
 Gundy put down his cigar for a moment 
 in the little tray beside him and exploded into 
 a peal of really mirthful laughter. He had a 
 ringing, silvery, boyish laugh. It did Gerald 
 good to hear it. One could not distrust a 
 man with such a laugh. Gundy fairly shook 
 and rolled in his chair.
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR RATT GUNDY 227 
 
 'My dear fellow, tliis is too delightful! 
 And are you really taken in — really and truly? 
 Why, I am a child of imagination far beyond 
 anything I ever ventured to dream of. I 
 shall take to the writing of sensation novels 
 next.' 
 
 ' Well, but do let me know what you are 
 laughing at. Give me a share in the joke. 
 Things are not quite so gladsome all round 
 that one can afford to miss his share in any 
 bit of fun.' 
 
 ' Good heavens! don't you see? Why, it's 
 all a piece of invention, that description ! 
 All my own, every word of it. I haven't 
 any such trophies, I haven't any sucli 
 weapons, I don't compose music and words 
 of songs, although I do flatter myself I can 
 sing a little.' 
 
 ' And you have not got all the presenta- 
 tion swords and pistols from everybody ? ' 
 
 a2
 
 228 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 ' Not a sword — not a pistol.' 
 
 Gerald was astounded. 
 
 ' And you did not capture the great bird ? ' 
 
 ' Oh, come now, I say, that is rather too 
 bad of you. You don't want to make me 
 believe that you could possibly have swal- 
 lowed that — the Roc — Sindbad the Sailor's 
 Roc ? By Jupiter ! I thought that was 
 rather overdoing it even for the "Moonbeam" 
 — I felt almost certain that would have blown 
 the gaff on me ; but it didn't — no, it didn't. 
 Why, I say, I suppose if I had sent it to the 
 " Catapult " it would have done you very well. 
 Do you know I had a great notion of saying 
 I liad captured the Roc in company with 
 two famous sporting friends of mine. Sir 
 John Mandeville and his Excellency Baron 
 Munchausen ! I am sorry I didn't now. 
 I suppose it would not have made any dif- 
 ference ? '
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR. RATT GUNDY 229 
 
 * Then do you really mean to say that all 
 that description was a pure invention of 
 yours ? ' 
 
 ' Every line of it,' Gundy said, with a look 
 of modest self-satisfaction — the look of one 
 who thinks that this time — come now — he 
 does deserve some praise. 
 
 ' And what on earth did you do it for ? ' 
 ' Why, don't you see ? Can't you 
 recognise the friendly touch of a good 
 comrade ? ' 
 
 ' Well, 1 am quite willing to grant the in- 
 tention — but I positively do not see the good 
 effect; 
 
 ' Xo ? That is odd ! How dull you news- 
 paper fellows are I — Why you are not one little 
 bit better than the " Moonbeam " yourself. Of 
 course I did the whole thing to give you a 
 lift, dear boy ! Don't you see P You come 
 out to-morrow — " The ' Moonbeam ' sold,""—
 
 230 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 " Hoax on our stupid contemporary," — " Our 
 vulgar rival makes a fool of himself again," 
 — " Up went the price of donkeys," — anything 
 you Kke — and then out you come with the 
 real, genuine, authentic, only warranted to 
 wash, fast-colours, entered at Stationers' Hall, 
 sole secured copyright edition, all rights 
 reserved, dramatic rights of course included, 
 version of an interview with Captain — Colonel 
 — perhaps you might make it Brigadier or 
 General Gundy, K.C.B.' 
 
 'But it will have to be admitted that 
 it was you yourself who hoaxed the 
 " Moonbeam " people,' Gerald said, a little 
 doubtful still as to his feelings on the whole 
 subject, and wishing his new friend had not 
 quite so exuberant a sense of humour. 
 
 ' Yes, yes, of course ; isn't that the real 
 fun of the thing? Why not have a hne 
 " Hoaxed by Gundy himself? " I'll stand by
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR. RATT GUNDY 231 
 
 you, old chap. I'll say I did it all because I 
 considered the " Moonbeam " utterly un- 
 worthy of any serious contribution, but that, 
 stupid as I thought it, I did not think it was 
 quite so ignorant an idiot as to be taken in 
 by the sort of thing I sent along. My dear 
 fellow, I see any number of extra editions of 
 the " Catapult " in the whole affair. Why, 
 look here — " Colonel Gundy 's own explana- 
 tion," — " How Gundy hoaxed our ridiculous 
 contemporary," — " Gundy's own authentic ex- 
 planation," — there are thousands of copies in 
 that. By the way. Aspen, why do you always 
 call each other " our contemporary ? " Why 
 not call them by their name as people do in 
 ordinary existence ? ' 
 
 Gerald was amazed, amused — not quite 
 certain whether he had to do with an alto- 
 gether sane man in his adventurous new 
 friend. But certainly in all his ordinary
 
 232 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 demeanour Gundy, notwithstanding his odd 
 manner and ways of looking at things, seemed 
 sane and shrewd enough. 
 
 ' Well, now for the real interview,' Gundy 
 said, after he had puffed his cigar vehemently 
 and chuckled to himself, gasping between the 
 puffs. 
 
 * Just before going to the real interview — 
 the interview for print, you know — I should like 
 to ask you a few questions on my own account.' 
 
 ' I see. Not necessarily for publication, 
 but as a guarantee of good faith.' 
 
 ' No,' Gerald said, laughing at the incor- 
 rigible levity of his companion, * not exactly 
 that, but to enable myself personally to under- 
 stand something of the mystery, for there is 
 some ghastly mystery in it — the mystery of 
 this whole business.' 
 
 ' All right — ask me any question you like 
 and ril tell you no lies — there's a variation on
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR. RATT GUNDY 233 
 
 the good old saying, ain't it ? You go ahead, 
 and keep in the main channel, or in midstream 
 just as long as you can.' Mr. Gundy settled 
 himself out for a comfortable smoke and a 
 good long talk. 
 
 ' Let's begin at the beginning. I want to 
 hear about all of you who were in this 
 company or association, whatever it was 
 called.' 
 
 Gundy laughed. ' All right — let me see — 
 there were five of us, you know — Seth 
 Chickering — your father — who always kept 
 to his own name like the true-born Briton 
 that he was ' 
 
 ' Yes,' Aspen said, hurriedly. * The next ? ' 
 In truth, he was a little afraid to hear much 
 about his father. He preferred to have as 
 few revelations as possible. The details of 
 camp life on the Veldt might be highly droll 
 and diverting about the father of someone
 
 234 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 else, but Gerald had a good depth of reverence 
 in him yet, and did not care for any anecdotes 
 Mr. Gundy might have on the subject of the 
 late Mr. Aspen. 
 
 ' Seth Chickering — he kept his own name 
 too. I needn't tell you much about poor old 
 Seth. You saw him only once, but such as 
 you saw him then you would have seen him 
 if you had known him for any number of 
 years. Simple as a child, and plucky as an 
 Encflish bull-doof — stick to his friend in life or 
 death, and act like a man to his open enemy — 
 not a treacherous touch or a drop of coward's 
 blood about good old Seth.' 
 
 ' Yes — I should have thought all that. 
 Well— the next ? ' 
 
 ' There was Captain Locke, an Englishman, 
 too. We christened him Warbler, because 
 he sang so much, and so well.' Mr. Gundy 
 spoke with a certain pathos in his voice.
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR. RATT GUNDY 235 
 
 ' How did be die ? ' Gerald asked, inspired 
 to this question by the tone of Gundy's 
 allusion. 
 
 Gundv had let his cifjar cro out. He 
 struck a match and relit it. The operation 
 seemed to occupy much attention on his 
 part. He looked away from Gerald as he 
 answered. 
 
 ' As a good many chaps die in such places 
 — killed in a fight. It was a fair fight though, 
 mind,' he added hastily, ' although I believe 
 he was driven on to it — forced into it — and 
 that he never wanted to kill a fly on his own 
 account.' 
 
 ' Driven into the fight by the man that 
 killed him?' 
 
 ' No, by Jupiter ! ' Gundy exclaimed, with 
 a sudden burst of passion. ' The man that 
 killed him was driven on, too, by that devil 
 called Noah Bland.'
 
 236 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 ' Noah Bland ! The man who was 
 lynched ? ' 
 
 ' Yes ; after I left. I don't know where 
 he was spawned, or what thieves' kitchen sent 
 him out, but there he was, and he claimed to 
 be the first man that found the diamonds, and 
 he was not ; he only watched and hung on 
 the track of cleverer men, and came up 
 at the right moment and cried halves — you 
 know the sort of thiDg — at least you would 
 if you had been gold mining or diamond 
 
 mmmg. 
 
 * You were all Englishmen ? ' 
 
 'All but Seth Chickering, and after all he 
 was of the same flesh and blood. That was why 
 we formed a company, to pull together English- 
 speaking chaps, and guarantee each other 
 against the Afrikanders of all sorts and colours. 
 Not but that some of the very worst of the 
 same Afrikanders were not a deuced deal
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR. RATT GUNDY 237 
 
 better than such a cad of an EngUshman as 
 Noah Bland.' 
 
 ' Well, you agreed to work together.' 
 ' Yes, we airreed to work to^jether. and to 
 hold on together, and to divide, share and 
 share alike, and to have a regular offensive 
 and defensive alliance. We agreed that if any 
 of us died, his share was to come to any one 
 he liked to name as his heir, and that the 
 others were to take care that the proper 
 person was found. If any chap died without 
 telling of any heir, then the share was to be 
 divided among the surviving partners or the 
 heirs of dead partners. Seth had charge of 
 all the wills, and he told us himself that he 
 didn't have any kith or kin, and that his money, 
 if he should be bowled over, was to be divided 
 among his surviving pals. But, good heavens ! 
 whoever thought of Seth Chickering getting 
 bowled over like that ! If I were the president
 
 238 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 of an insurance company I would have gone 
 dead on Seth's life. Now, Noah Bland — there 
 was a fellow you might expect shot or lynched 
 any day. By Jove ! I remember Seth nearly 
 killing him once upon a time.' And here 
 Gundy's face darkened again. 
 
 ' What about ? ' 
 
 ' About falsehood and treachery — about 
 lying and making mischief — about fetching 
 and carrying. I didn't know it then or I 
 should have done the trick for him myself.' 
 
 ' Didn't know what .^ ' 
 
 ' That he had made the mischief — told the 
 lies on both sides — got up the quarrel — forced 
 on the row. The blood of poor Captain 
 Warbler was as surely on Noah Bland's head 
 as I am sitting here with you now.' 
 
 ' Bland is dead.' 
 
 ' I was glad to hear that justice had
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR. RATT GUNDY 239 
 
 overtaken him,' Gundy said with unwonted 
 gravity. 
 
 'And the man you call Warbler — what 
 about him ? ' 
 
 ' We all Uked Warbler — he had, do you 
 see, the inestimable advantage of being a 
 gentleman. Hd had odd ways and he did not 
 take much care of himself, but he had a brave 
 good heart, and as I have been saying, he was 
 a gentleman. WeU — rest his soul! — he sang 
 us many a good song and told us many a good 
 story. He used to talk sometimes to Seth 
 Chickering and to me, but more to Seth — 
 Seth was a graver and more sympathetic chap 
 than I — I vieux jils de rire et de blaspheme — isn't 
 that the phrase in the scrofulous French novel ? 
 — but he talked to me too sometimes — abou 
 her' 
 
 ' About whom ? ' Gerald asked, although 
 he knew well that it was about Fidelia.
 
 240 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 ' About his little daughter — here at home 
 in England. Look here, Aspen, I like you — 
 I have taken a liking to you — and, by Jove ! I 
 don't know whether it does you credit or the 
 reverse that I should have taken a liking to 
 you. Most of my family, I dare say, would 
 make out that the mere fact of my taking a 
 liking to you ought to damn your character 
 for ever. Bat I do like you all the same — 
 and we may as well have this thing out first 
 as last. It's about this girl I have come to 
 England.' 
 
 ' You know her then ? ' Gerald asked in 
 some surprise and with an inexplicable feeling 
 of dissatisfaction. 
 
 ' Know her ? Not I. How on earth 
 should I know her ? I know her name and I 
 know where she lives, but I don't know 
 wliether she is ten years old or twenty. I 
 came because I thought I should like to find
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR, RATT GUNDY 241 
 
 her out and to make sure that she got her 
 
 rights.' 
 
 * That was kind of you ' 
 
 ' Was it ? Wait until you know.' 
 
 * Out of regard for her father's memory ? ' 
 
 ' No ; not that. At least not that alone. 
 I came because I could not rest — because 
 'twas I that killed her father.' 
 
 Gerald started. This was, indeed, a reve- 
 lation. 
 
 ' I want to know that girl,' Ratt said. 
 ' The idea has got hold of me.' 
 
 * I think I would shake it off if I were 
 you,' Gerald answered. 
 
 ' Why so ? ' 
 
 ' How could you take her hand — how 
 could you give her your hand — the hand that 
 killed her father ? ' 
 
 'That's where it is, exactly. I want to 
 know her — I want to do something for her. 
 
 VOL. I. R
 
 242 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 I should like to die for her if I might, and if 
 it would do her any good. Look here, I am 
 not a moral man or a scrupulous man even. 
 I am shockingly wanting in a sense of moral 
 responsibility, but I do feel a ghastly sense of 
 responsibility for that man's death. Why, I 
 have seen men killed by hundreds in my 
 South American experiences, and have killed 
 men myself, and have thought no more about 
 it than about the killing of cockroaches. 
 What do I care about a man or a man's life, 
 unless the man is my friend ? But this man's 
 life I do care about. It was a fair fight. He 
 was set on to me by that scoundrel, Noah 
 Bland, and I killed him in self-defence — if I 
 hadn't shot him he would have shot me. 
 What is there to repent of in that ? Yet I do 
 repent of it. I wish I could find a woman's 
 relief from trouble and have a good cry 
 over it.'
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR. RATT GUNDY 243 
 
 ' Give me your hand, old man,' Aspen 
 said ; ' you are a good chap.' 
 
 * I don't think so ; I come of a bad lot. 
 Curious, all the women in our family were 
 saints, and all the men were devils. All the 
 women even who married into us were good, 
 and all the men bad. Well, my first, my very 
 first feehng of what people call conscience is 
 about that girl's father. I wish to Heaven I 
 had let him hit me ; I wish to Heaven I had 
 let him shoot me ! Why do I feel like that ? 
 Some of the fellows I have seen killed — ay, 
 and killed with my own hand — I daresay they 
 had daughters too. But I don't know. I 
 have got this girl on the brain, and I am 
 bound to know her and to help her all I can. 
 You can introduce me, can't you ? ' 
 
 ' I couldn't. I don't know why. I under- 
 stand your feeling, and I honour you for it. 
 But you have killed the girl's father, and I 
 
 B 2
 
 244 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 couldn't present you as the man who did it, 
 and I couldn't pass you off as a man who 
 didn't do it. There's my position, Gundy. 
 I like you immensely, I don't blame you 
 one little bit, but somehow I couldn't do 
 that: 
 
 Gundy drew a deep breath. 
 
 ' Odd thing,' he said, ' how anybody will 
 help a man to get bad, and how few, even 
 among the good, will help him to get back 
 to something like goodness ! I thought you 
 were the very man to help me to get ac- 
 quainted with that girl — but you have 
 scruples. Well —all right. I liave a way of 
 my own, old chap — a way quite without you. 
 It will cost me something — the giving up of a 
 resolve I had formed. I was determined not 
 to go back to civilisation — now I've got to go 
 back to it — all through you. But I don't 
 blame you, and I shan't bear any malice.'
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR. RATT GUNDY 245 
 
 Gundy smiled his sweet, bright boyish smile, 
 and held out his hand to Gerald. 
 
 ' What do you mean by going back to 
 civilisation?' Gerald asked. 'Do you mean 
 staying in London ? You must stay in 
 London if you want to see her.' He did not 
 mention her name. He had grown shy 
 already of mentioning her name. 
 
 ' Wait and you'll see,' said Gundy. ' One 
 favour, my boy, I have to ask, and it's this. 
 A man may have different names in life, 
 mayn't he ? There may be one name for 
 London and another name for South Africa, 
 eh ? Well, if you should ever meet me witli 
 my London name, would you have the good- 
 ness to forget that I ever called myself Eatt 
 Gundy, there's a good chap ? ' 
 
 ' I say, what darksome mystery is this ? 
 May I not have the first of it for the 
 " Catapult " ? '
 
 246 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 'Not a bit of it — this little business is 
 purely private and confidential. We shall 
 meet again, as they say in the plays, and you 
 will hear of me by a different name, and that 
 will be my real name — and all I ask you to 
 do is not to express any wild amazement over 
 the transformation, but just to take it for 
 granted and drop Eatt Gundy for the present. 
 If you want Ratt again you can send for him 
 at any moment and he's bound to come. But 
 above all things remember that to that girl I 
 am not Ratt Gundy — I am myself alone. 
 Ratt Gundy killed her father — well and good 
 — I mean ill and bad — but I am not Ratt 
 Gundy — I am myself again. Don't be alarmed, 
 old chap ; there's no deception in the business, 
 all on the square, honest Injun : my identity 
 can be warranted on the most respectable 
 authority. I can have a bishop to avouch 
 it if you like — we have one in the family.'
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR. RATT GUNDY 247 
 
 Eatt stood up and the two young men 
 parted. Gerald went home much mystified 
 and feehng as if he were treading the mazes 
 of a Christmas pantomime. Was everybody 
 going to turn out to be somebody else ? The 
 other day he himself was a poor young man 
 — now he was to be a rich young man, and 
 hardly knew how it all came about. The other 
 day he made the acquaintance of Seth Chick- 
 ering, and now Seth Chickering was the 
 victim of a mysterious murder. The other 
 day he had never heard of Fidelia Locke, and 
 now he was linked with her in a strange 
 sort of coUeagueship, and he was falling fast 
 in love with her. The other day he had never 
 heard of Eatt Gundy, and now Eatt Gundy 
 was his fast friend — and was the man who had 
 killed Fidelia's father. And now Eatt Gundy 
 was turning out not to be Eatt Gundy at all, 
 but somebody quite different, who was to
 
 248 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 come on Gerald with absolute surprise. 
 ' This is becoming rather too much for me,' 
 tlie young man thought, as he walked home- 
 ward. ' My whole life is getting to be a puzzle. 
 I don't quite know what is real and what is not 
 real. And it's of no manner of use to me for 
 the " Catapult " — being all true nobody would 
 believe it.' 
 
 That evening Eatt Gundy went to his 
 chambers, paid his bills, gave handsome 
 largesse to the servants, had his trunk packed 
 — he travelled as experienced travellers 
 generally do, with very little luggage, and 
 that little well compressed — announced that he 
 was going out to South America, and drove 
 to the railway station and took a ticket for 
 Southampton. He did not go on board 
 any steamer, however. He remained in 
 Southampton only one night, and returned to 
 London next day, having contrived in the
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH MR. RATT GUNDY 249 
 
 meantime to make a considerable change in 
 his appearance. When he reached London 
 he took rooms at Claridge's Hotel, and then 
 visited tailors, hatters, and bootmakers of the 
 most approved order. As he was passing a 
 large mirror in one of the hotel halls he looked 
 at his OAvn face in it and smiled. It was not 
 admiration for his own personal appearance 
 that caused the smile. ' I don't suppose 
 Margaret would know me again in any case,' 
 he said to himself, 'but at all events she 
 wouldn't recognise Eatt Gundy in me, even if 
 she had ever seen the worthy Eatt.' 
 
 It was soon known in the hotel that the 
 new comer was the brother of an earl, and 
 that he had been about the world a great 
 deal. There was a vague impression that he 
 had been rather a bad lot, but that he was 
 not nearly so bad as his brother, and an 
 impression got about that he had come home
 
 250 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 with a good deal of money, all which facts or 
 fancies were duly chronicled in the columns 
 of the enterprising ' Catapult.' But Gerald 
 Aspen did not do any interviewing at 
 Claridge's. The new comer, although the 
 brother of an earl, was not nearly so 
 interesting a person as Eatt Gundy, and the 
 ' Catapult ' did not take any pains about him. 
 The ' Moonbeam ' made no attempt to compete 
 for him, but indeed the ' Moonbeam ' had not 
 yet quite got over the discouraging effect of 
 the hoax perpetrated so mercilessly by Eatt 
 Gundy. The change of personality was a 
 source of fresh delight to Eatt himself, who 
 enjoyed everything that came in his way, and 
 could, if need were, have lived in a nutshell, 
 and counted himself a king of infinite space.
 
 251 
 
 CHAPTER Xn 
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 
 
 So loner as man remains the man lie is the 
 
 o 
 
 sword will always exert its ghttering fascina- 
 tion over him. It may be barbarous to love 
 white weapons, and we may grow out of it in 
 time, and certainly we carry swords by our 
 sides no longer ; but the sword is a brilliant 
 creature, and modern man, draped in the 
 clinging garments of civilisation, is often as 
 eager to catch it by the handle as young 
 Achilles was when Ulysses found him in 
 Scyros with the girl's gown upon him. It 
 is a question that sometimes troubles the 
 reflective mind, how will a distant generation, 
 to whom the famihar carrying of swords has
 
 252 
 
 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 become so much a thing of the past as to be 
 almost forgotten, how will it enjoy all that 
 shining page of romance, all those cloak-and- 
 sword dramas and tales, all the epic books 
 and the epic dramas, to the understanding of 
 which a familiarity with arms seems essential ? 
 Up to yesterday, as it were, the world had 
 been all the same ; custom had run on the old 
 lines ; gentlemen had carried swords from the 
 days of Diomede to the days of Diderot. 
 Shakespeare's brilHant swordsmen, his Eomeos 
 and Glosters, were as much of kin to our great- 
 grandfathers as they were to the Elizabethans 
 for whom they were written, as they would have 
 been to the Homeric heroes who figure meta- 
 morphosed in ' Troilus and Cressida/ But how 
 will they seem to that posterity to whom the 
 idea of weapons, save as the tools of a mihtary 
 caste, are grown as unfamiliar as incantations ? 
 Some such reflections were passing through
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 253 
 
 Lady Scardale's mind as she stood in the great 
 gymnasium hall watching the fencing lesson. 
 For Lady Scardale was as eager and as 
 advanced in her ideas concerning bodily 
 training as she was in her ideas concerning 
 mental training, and if her court was a little 
 Academe for her giids' minds to widen in, it 
 had a strong Spartan element in it of physical 
 exercise as well. Lady Scardale's ideal woman 
 was to be as excellent in bodily accomplish- 
 ments as in mental endowments, and every 
 one who came under Lady Scardale's influence 
 was expected to conform so far to Lady Scar- 
 dale's theories as to devote a certain portion 
 of the day to bodily exercise. A girl might 
 go in for what are called calisthenics, or for 
 the more serious gymnastics which daring 
 woman adopts now with a success that would 
 have astonished — and shocked — our great- 
 grandmothers, or she might dance — especially
 
 254 J^ED DIAMONDS 
 
 those beautiful old-fashioned dances, pavanes, 
 and minuets, and gavottes, which gave our 
 ancestresses grace and dignity of movement — 
 or she might go in for fencing. For the 
 matter of that, any enterprising young woman 
 might go in for all these accomplishments, and 
 many of Lady Scardale's disciples did, and dis- 
 tinguished themselves therein. But if Lady 
 Scardale had a belief in the efficacy of any 
 one form of bodily exercise over another she 
 had a belief in the efficacy of fencing. 
 
 Fencing she argued, and argued rightly, 
 gave the body more universal exercise than 
 almost any other form of physical test, and 
 she insisted that in England especially, where 
 no one fought duels, it was just as valuable 
 an accomplishment for women as for men. So 
 fencing was an established portion of the girls' 
 education at Lady Scardale's place, and the 
 fencing hour was one of the most interesting
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 255 
 
 hours in Lady Scardale's day. Every day a 
 skilled fencing-master came for an hour to 
 give instruction in the handling of the rapier, 
 and a very pretty sight the lesson was. The 
 girls wore a dress that was at once admirably 
 adapted for the purpose, and at the same 
 time exceedingly becoming, and the great hall 
 presented a very animated appearance while 
 the lesson went on ; the professor instructing 
 novices in the beginnings of the great art in 
 one spot while in others mimic combats were 
 going on between girls whose training was 
 sufficiently far advanced to allow them to 
 practise by themselves, while in another the 
 few girls whom the professor had specially 
 singled out for their excellence and address 
 were engaged in getting their inexperienced 
 sisters into shape, so that they should have 
 less to learn when they came under the eye of 
 the master. Lady Scardale almost always
 
 256 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 came in at fencing time and watched the 
 lesson. She sat on a kind of little dais or raised 
 gallery at the end of the room, a dais led up 
 to by two or three short steps, and provided 
 with chairs for the benefit of the occasional 
 visitors, friends of Lady Scardale or of the 
 girls, who were privileged to see the lesson. 
 
 On this occasion Lady Scardale sat en- 
 throned upon her dais, watching the lesson 
 with the grave attention which she always 
 gave to everything to which she devoted her- 
 self. Indeed there was something more than 
 her usual interest displayed, for the fencing- 
 master was giving a lesson to Fideha Locke, 
 and anything in which Fidelia was concerned 
 always inspirited Lady Scardale with an ex- 
 ceptional interest. The interest seemed to 
 be shared by the fencing master, for he 
 appeared to be giving his lesson with a 
 greater zeal and closer attention than he gave
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 257 
 
 to his other pupils. He was always thorough ; 
 he was always painstaking ; he was always 
 patient — as indeed a man requires to be who 
 takes upon himself the task of teaching 
 women to handle the small sword ; but, as it 
 had seemed to the keen eyes of Lady Scar- 
 dale, he was more thorough and more patient 
 and took more pains when he was teaching 
 Fideha Locke than he did at any other time. 
 But, indeed, Fidelia Locke was a very brilliant 
 pupil ; quick in this as in everything else she 
 tried, she was already one of the best fencers 
 in the class, and any fencing-master might 
 well be proud of her quickness and address. 
 Lady Scardale's fencing-master permitted 
 himself to say as much to Lady Scardale when 
 Lady Scardale once questioned him as to 
 FideUa's progress, and as he did so it seemed 
 to Lady Scardale that he showed, for him, a 
 most unusual animation. For it was not 
 VOL. T. S
 
 2S8 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 apparently in the nature of that fencing- 
 master to be animated. 
 
 He was a curious-looking man, this 
 fencing-master. The splendour of his art, 
 the brightness of the sword, had not passed 
 into him. Tall and thin and dark, always 
 closely shaven as he was, there was ever a 
 deep blue-black shadow on his face ; always 
 clad in close-fitting black garments, there was 
 something queerly funereal about him which 
 was the reverse of exhilarating. He looked 
 as if he were ready for a duel in which he was 
 certain to kill his man, and the very certainty 
 had imparted a settled melancholy to his 
 manner and an additional sombreness to his 
 attire. His lean, dark-skinned face, swarthy 
 as a Sicilian's, seldom relaxed from an expres- 
 sion of rigid gravity. His thin lips seldom 
 smiled. His eyes were intensely black — not 
 brilliantly black, like the eyes of children of
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 259 
 
 the South, but of a dull deep blackness which 
 seemed never to betray a hint of the man's 
 nature or of the man's thoughts. Indeed, 
 when Lady Scardale had first seen him, she 
 thought him a most forbidding-looking person, 
 but he was so excellently recommended, had so 
 many diplomas, certificates and letters from 
 all the best schools and masters of fence on 
 the Continent, that she could not very well 
 dechne his services on the ground of his blue- 
 black cheeks, funereal bearing and unpleasant 
 eyes. ' All the better,' she said to herself ; 
 ' the less chance of any of the girls falling 
 in love with him.' So he became her fenc- 
 ing-master, and a very admirable fencing- 
 master he proved himself to be. Lady Scar- 
 dale, who knew something about fencing, 
 as she knew something about most arts, 
 could see that for herself after the first 
 lesson. 
 
 s 2
 
 26o RED DIAMONDS 
 
 The place was very quiet, as far indeed as 
 the term can be applied to a place where a 
 series of fencing lessons are going on. But 
 the incessant clinking of steel against steel, 
 and the incessant movement of feet had some- 
 thing rhythmical in them, something even 
 soporific, and Lady Scardale felt an uncom- 
 promising drowsiness creeping over her. She 
 was just remembering in a confused kind of 
 mood some verses of one of the young poets 
 who sometimes came in her way, in which he 
 would speak of sleepiness as Drowsihead, and 
 the word Drowsihead seemed to be keeping in 
 chime with the clink of the swords and the 
 moving feet, when she was suddenly startled 
 from her oblivion by hearing her name men- 
 tioned in respectful loudness. 
 
 Lady Scardale opened her eyes with a start. 
 One of her maids — Lady Scardale would only 
 be waited upon by women-servants — was
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 261 
 
 standing before her with a letter on a salver. 
 Lady Scardale smiled. 
 
 ' I was up rather late last night, PHmmer, 
 she said, ' and I do beheve that I was dozing.' 
 
 She put out her hand for the letter. 
 
 ' It came by a cab just now, my lady,' said 
 the maid, and disappeared. 
 
 Lady Scardale held the letter in her hand. 
 Her eyes were still but half awake. It was a 
 letter on thick club paper, sealed with a large 
 red seal, and addressed in a bold, masculine 
 hand. Suddenly Lady Scardale knew that she 
 was wide awake, that the arms on the seal 
 were most familiar to her, and that the hand- 
 writing stirred her heart with a swift rush of 
 many memories. 
 
 Fidelia Locke, earnestly endeavouring to 
 plant her foil on the leather plastron of the 
 fencing-master's chest, was suddenly startled 
 by a little cry from the dais. Instantly she
 
 262 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 lowered her foil and turned to where Lady 
 Scardale was sitting. Lady Scardale was 
 bending forward in her chair, holding a letter 
 in her hand and with a strange look on her face. 
 
 Fideha flung aside her foil and ran swiftly 
 to Lady Scardale's side. The fencing-master, 
 stooping, picked up the fallen foil and moved 
 slowly after her. 
 
 ' Dear Lady Scardale,' said Fideha, ' is 
 there anything the matter ? ' For she had 
 been startled by the look on Lady Scardale's 
 face. ' Is there any bad news ? ' she now 
 added, for she saw that there were tears in 
 Lady Scardale's eyes. 
 
 ' Bad news ? ' said Lady Scardale, looking 
 up into Fideha's questioning face. 'Oh no, 
 my dear — no, no. Please go on with the 
 lesson, Mr. Bostock, with someone else. I 
 want Miss Locke for the moment. Eead that, 
 my dear.'
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 263 
 
 Lady Scardale put the letter into Fidelia's 
 hand, and the girl read it while the fencing- 
 master moved back and chose for himself 
 another pupil. 
 
 This is what Fidelia read : — 
 
 ' My Dear, — I have come back upon your 
 hands like a bad shilling — but still I don't 
 think I am quite so bad as the bad shilling, for 
 I fancy there is something to be made of me 
 even yet. You always had a sort of faith that 
 good was to be got out of me, and yet, dear 
 sister, I think you, more than any other in the 
 world, have put me out of conceit with myself, 
 for if you could make nothing out of me, didn't 
 that plainly show that there was nothing to be 
 made? Well, here I am again, anyhow, and 
 I have made a fortune in the meantime — 
 honestly too, which is the curious part of the 
 business — and whenever my dear sister wants 
 to see her most good-for-nothing, once pauper-
 
 264 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 ised now rich brother-in-law, she has only 
 to send a message to Claridge's Hotel and he 
 comes. 
 
 ' Worthlessly but still lovingly yours, 
 ' EuPERT Granton.' 
 'Oh, Fidelia,' Lady Scardale exclaimed, 
 with tears in her eyes, ' how good Heaven is 
 to me — how happy I am ! I have got my 
 brother-in-law Eupert back again ! ' And the 
 warm-hearted woman's eyes were filled with 
 tears, and indeed the tears were coming into the 
 eyes of Fidelia also. For she knew all about 
 Eupert Granton — how much Lady Scardale 
 had loved him — how much he had loved her 
 — how kind he was and tender and all unlike 
 her husband — and yet how wild he was, and 
 how the bad blood of the family was in him, 
 and how he would leave the sheltering arms 
 of her affection and go out of sight and of 
 civilisation, and wander far away somewhere
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 265 
 
 and be heard of no more until this day, this 
 joyous day, this day of hope and gratitude. 
 Then Lady Scardale sat hurriedly at her desk 
 and scribbled a little note, which contained 
 nothing but the words, ' Come to me at once, 
 darling brother ' ; and then Lady Scardale 
 cried on Fideha's neck, and Fidelia did some 
 crying, too, out of sweet and sympathetic 
 companionship. Nobody noticed them. The 
 girls were too busy in employing the latest 
 moments of the rapidly waning hour. The 
 fencing-master never noticed, or at least never 
 seemed to notice, anything. 
 
 Presently a bell rang to announce that the 
 hour was done and that the first lesson in 
 fencing had come to an end. The girls took 
 off their masks and put their foils carefully 
 into racks in the walls, and rapidly dispersed 
 in all directions to their various duties for the 
 time. The fencing-master still hngered in
 
 266 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 the liall, occupying himself with his gear. 
 On another occasion Lady Scardale might 
 have imagined that he was hngering to get 
 another word with Fideha Locke by her side 
 on the dais, but just then she was too much 
 occupied to think of anything. 
 
 Through the pretty crowd of dispersing 
 maidens Plimmer made her way again, this 
 time with a card on a salver. It bore the 
 name of Eupert Granton. ' Oh ! ' said Lady 
 Scardale, 'I will come at once.' But there 
 was no need for her to move, for Mr. Eupert 
 Granton had very composedly followed on 
 Plimmer's heels, and was standing at the end 
 of the hall. The fencing-master, having 
 finished his preparations for the next lesson, 
 was just passing through the door as Eupert 
 Granton entered. He drew back, looked 
 curiously into ]\ir. Granton's face, and passed 
 on. In another moment Eupert Granton had
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 267 
 
 crossed the hall, and was holding Lady 
 Scardale's hand. 
 
 Fideha rose to go away and leave the two 
 together. 
 
 ' No, dearest — don't go,' Lady Scardale 
 said, ' I would rather you were here at the 
 first meeting. Later, if we want to say any- 
 thing in particular, you can go if you like, 
 but I would rather you stayed with me 
 now.' 
 
 Mr. Eupert Granton was simply our old 
 friend Eatt Gundy dressed quite up to date, 
 and cleanly shaven and wearing double eye- 
 glasses. He came over to Lady Scardale, who 
 was standing up to greet him, and he took 
 both her hands in his and tenderly kissed 
 them and looked into her eyes, and then he 
 kissed her forehead and did not yet speak a 
 word. 
 
 ' Dear Eupert — dearest brother — how
 
 2 68 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 long you have been away ! And you have 
 come back at last — I never thought you 
 would come back — I never hoped to see you 
 any more.' Then she threw her arms round 
 his neck and kissed him tenderly, fondly — 
 almost passionately. 
 
 ' I never meant to come back,' Granton 
 said. ' I did not think myself good enough to 
 come back. I had knocked about the world 
 too much and done too many queer things, 
 and I didn't think I could ever show myself 
 to you and your world again. And, to tell the 
 truth, dear sister, and shame a personage 
 whose acquaintance you will never have any 
 chance of making, I shouldn't have come back 
 even now but for a reason which has little or 
 nothing to do with you.' 
 
 ' Oh, no matter about the reason — no 
 matter why you have come, since only you 
 have come. I will try hard to keep you this
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 269 
 
 time — I will hold you and never let you 
 
 go.' 
 
 Fidelia was standing a little way back, 
 watching this singular meeting with the 
 deepest interest. 
 
 ' I don't think I should have ever known 
 you again,' Lady Scardale said, as she looked 
 fondly at the young man. ' Of course, it is a 
 long time ago, and you have changed and 
 grown and got strong. I should have known 
 you by your eyes, I think — but then you 
 cover them with glasses. Has your sight 
 grown short, Eupert dear ? ' 
 
 ' Sight wears out like other things in a 
 wild sort of hfe.' 
 
 ' Your love for me hasn't worn out ? ' she 
 asked plaintively, ' even in your wild life — if 
 it was wild. Oh, I should have known you 
 by your voice, Eupert dear ! Come — I must 
 introduce you, before I say another word
 
 270 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 about myself, to my dear friend and colleague, 
 Miss Fidelia Locke.' She drew Fidelia forward 
 by the arm, and Fidelia looked frankly into 
 the briorht, handsome face of the stranorer. 
 
 One who had known Eatt Gundy would 
 not have been likely to know him again in 
 Rupert Granton. The great drooping 
 moustache had gone, the chin and cheeks 
 were closely shaven, and the pince-nez con- 
 cealed the bold brightness of the eyes. Eatt 
 Gundy used to wear his hair rather long, and 
 dress carelessly — Eupert Granton wore his 
 hair cropped close to his head, and was 
 elaborately got up in the latest London style. 
 Even under the pince-nez, however, Fidelia 
 could see that his eyes drooped when he saw 
 her, and that his cheek coloured a little, and 
 he seemed embarrassed. Can it be, she 
 thought, that this reckless wanderer is shy — 
 that he is afraid of a woman ?
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 271 
 
 If Eupert had, however, been overcome 
 by a momentary shyness, he evidently soon 
 got over it. He talked, in a rapid and easy 
 way, to his sister-in-law and to her friend. 
 He said but little of his own past Hfe, and 
 seemed to convey the idea that he would 
 prefer not to have anything said about it. He 
 told them that he had come last from South 
 America, that he had taken part in a revolu- 
 tion there, and that he had before that time 
 taken part in a revolution in Mexico ; but he 
 said nothing about mining adventures and 
 diamond fields. 
 
 Suddenly a new visitor was announced, at 
 the mention of w^hose name Fidelia dropped 
 her eyelids for a moment and then looked 
 up with a brightened face. The new-comer 
 was Gerald Aspen, a frequent visitor at the 
 College of Culture during recent days. He 
 came to Lady Scard ale's dais, and received
 
 272 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 the greetings of her kindly hand, and then 
 Fidelia shook hands with him, and then his 
 eyes fell bewildered on Eupert Granton. He 
 did not recognise him, and yet was utterly 
 puzzled with some strange impression that he 
 must have met him — that he ought to know 
 him — that the bearing of the man was 
 familiar. The mystery was explained when 
 Lady Scardale said : 
 
 ' This is my long-lost roving brother, come 
 back to civilisation and his loving sister-in- 
 law. Let me introduce Mr. Eupert Granton 
 to you, Mr. Aspen.' 
 
 Then Gerald's eyes met those of Eupert 
 Granton, and a look of meaning was inter- 
 changed, and Aspen knew the whole story. 
 
 ' Come and look at the fencing,' Lady 
 Scardale said after they had talked for some 
 time ; ' you used to be a great lover of fencing 
 at one time, Eupert.'
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 273 
 
 ' Yes, I have always kept it up a little 
 where I could,' Eupert said. 
 
 *'I am very fond of fencing,' Aspen said. 
 
 So they turned to look at the new bout of 
 fencing. Mr. Bostock had kept up his prac- 
 tice mechanically, it might almost seem, Avhile 
 they were speaking. He had the air of a 
 man who meant to convey the idea that the 
 talk which was going on was no business of 
 his. Yet if any of his pupils had noticed or 
 had watched the movement of his eyes for 
 other than fencing purposes, it might have 
 been seen how often he glanced round at the 
 da'is, and how he seemed to follow the move- 
 ments of Fidelia Locke with a keen and hungry 
 look. Bostock was able to use his eyes for 
 such purposes, for he was too good a fencer to 
 have to watch very narrowly the feints and 
 lunges of his pupils. He could spare many a 
 glance at Fidelia — and at Gerald Aspen too. 
 
 VOL. I. T
 
 274 J^ED DIAMONDS 
 
 The whole group of which Lady Scardale 
 was the centre moved towards Bostock, who 
 had just completed a lesson, and Lady Scar- 
 dale mtroduced her brother-in-law to Mr. 
 Bostock. 
 
 ' You seem to be a wonderful fencer,' 
 Granton said. 
 
 He had been watching the proceedings for 
 some moments with much interest, contrasting 
 the easy movements of the girls with the odd 
 alternations of rigidity and supple snakelike 
 swiftness which characterised the play of 
 Bostock. 
 
 Bostock turned and fixed his dull black 
 eyes on Granton's face. ' Yes,' he said 
 quietly, 'I do fence pretty well. And 
 you ? ' 
 
 He jerked out the question suddenly at 
 the end of his answer, and simple though it 
 sounded there was something in it of offence.
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 275 
 
 something taunting which irritated Granton, 
 as a chance stroke from a whip might. 
 
 ' I can do a httle of most things,' he 
 answered with a laugh. ' AVhen a man has 
 been in as many places as I have, he picks u]) 
 a smattering of various arts, as well as half-a- 
 dozen vocabularies. Jack-of-all-trades, you 
 know.' 
 
 Bostock gave his shoulders the least per- 
 ceptible little shrug. It suggested dexterously, 
 though by no means delicately, the scorn of the 
 expert for the amateur. Granton noted the 
 action, and was again annoyed, 
 
 ' I wish you would so far honour me, Pro- 
 fessor,' he said, slightly emphasizing the word 
 ' Professor,' ' as to allow me to cross foils with 
 you — if you are not too tired ? ' 
 
 He underlined the last phrase, ironically, 
 but the dull eyes of Bostock grew no brighter. 
 
 ' I am not tired,' he said simply. 'If you
 
 276 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 will come into my dressing-room I can lend 
 you some things.' 
 
 The girls had all gone away by this time ; 
 only Lady Scardale remained in the room, 
 and of course Fidelia. Lady Scardale 
 declared that she was most anxious to see 
 Eupert handle a foil again after all these 
 years. She had seen him fence with his 
 brother often enough in the old days, and she 
 remembered his skill, and was curious to see 
 it displayed again. Fidelia begged to be per- 
 mitted to remain, and Eupert expressed him- 
 self as at once delighted and dismayed. To 
 tell the truth, he did not in his heart feel in 
 the least dismayed. He was perfectly confi- 
 dent that he could score off Bostock, and he 
 was very willing indeed that the process 
 should take place before Fidelia. So he fol- 
 lowed Bostock into his dressing-room with the 
 thin ghost of a whistle playing about his hps.
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 277 
 
 In a few moments Granton came back 
 arrayed in the panoply of the mimic duello. 
 
 Then the fencing began ; Gerald, standing 
 on the little dais between Lady Scardale and 
 Fideha, watched it with the interest which he 
 felt in everything in which Granton took part. 
 Granton was always something of a puzzle to 
 him, but he could not help liking the man 
 and his extraordinary buoyancy and his 
 wonderful ability in doing a great variety of 
 thino-s. It was evident from the first moment 
 when he crossed foils with the master that 
 fencing was included in the things that 
 Granton did well, but it was evident also, at 
 least to a skilled swords woman like Fidelia, 
 that Granton had entered upon the contest 
 with a degree of confidence which he did not 
 keep unshaken after the first few seconds. 
 Indeed it was so. Granton had been con- 
 vinced that he would show this teacher of
 
 278 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 girls what fencing really meant. He had 
 handled a sword since he was a schoolboy, he 
 had handled swords since on fields where the 
 issue certainly meant danger, and might very 
 well mean death, and he had had the best of 
 it in the few cases in which it was a matter of 
 very serious importance to him that he should 
 have the best of it. He had tried his hand 
 with every Prevot darmes in Europe, and had 
 always come off well ; he had been a member, 
 and a distinguished member, of a famous 
 London fencing club in the days when he still 
 more or less adorned society. So he had 
 prepared to attack Bostock with the same 
 composure that an Espada would show who 
 was advancing towards the fated bull. 
 
 But a few seconds changed his mood. It 
 only needed half-a-dozen passes to convince 
 him that Bostock was the toughest of fencers 
 he had ever encountered, and a few more that
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 279 
 
 the man was really and truly a master of his 
 weapon. At first Granton had attacked 
 swiftly and incisively, trying botte after hotte — 
 and he knew many a one — with amazing 
 rapidity. But Bostock met every one of 
 them with an imperturbable certainty which 
 astonished Granton. If the man's rapier had 
 been a very wall of steel he could hardly have 
 seemed to be more securely shut off from all 
 Granton's assaults. Then in his turn Bostock 
 began to attack, and Granton felt that the 
 tables were being turned on him with a 
 vengeance. He defended himself as despe- 
 rately as if he had been really fighting for his 
 life on some grey morning in a Parisian park, 
 and for some brilliant despairing seconds he 
 succeeded in keeping Bostock off. But only 
 for a few seconds. Suddenly the fencing- 
 master's weapon gleamed before his eyes in an 
 unexpected feint, then there was a dexterous
 
 28o RED DIAMONDS 
 
 turn of the wrist, a sudden sense on Granton's 
 heart that he and his foil were quite alone in 
 the world, and the next moment he felt the 
 decisive touch on the breast just where the 
 little crimson heart was sewn on to the leather 
 of his jerkin. 
 
 Granton dropped his foil, Bostock 
 recovered and saluted, Fidelia applauded, 
 Gerald smiled slightly, and Lady Scardale 
 looked anxious. Granton noted each action 
 and understood it. Fideha had applauded 
 because she loved the game so well that she 
 must applaud the most skilful, quite apart 
 from any personal feeling. Gerald had looked 
 surprised because he had not expected to see 
 Granton defeated. Lady Scardale looked 
 anxious because it slightly worried her to 
 think that her favourite should not succeed 
 in anything he undertook. Granton had to 
 admit to himself that he felt somewhat
 
 A MASTER OF FENCE 281 
 
 chagrined. He had wanted that applause of 
 Fideha's to be given to him ; he had counted 
 upon it almost as a certainty, and after all it 
 had been given to that funereal fellow, who 
 was standing there bolt upright and staring 
 with his dull expressionless eyes at the dais 
 where the fair Fideha was enthroned like a 
 queen of beauty. But Granton was not going 
 to allow any hint of chagrin to betray itself 
 in his manner. 
 
 ' Well done,' he said, laughing and 
 extending his hand to Bostock, who bowed 
 stiffly but did not take it ; ' I thought I was a 
 pretty smart fencer, but I have met my match 
 this time and no mistake. You must have 
 studied in rare schools.' 
 
 Bostock bowed again as stiffly as before. 
 
 ' It was worth taking pains about,' he 
 said, ' and I took pains.' 
 
 ' I believe one ^an succeed in anything if 
 
 VOL. I. u
 
 282 RED DIAMONDS 
 
 one only takes pains enough,' Granton 
 rejoined, lifting his mask from his face and 
 moving towards the dais. 
 
 The fencing-master looked after him. ' I 
 hope so,' he said, more to himself than to 
 Granton. 
 
 END OF THE FIKST VOLUME 
 
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