The Datchet Diamonds Page 8

  CHAPTER VIII

  IN THE MOMENT OF HIS SUCCESS

  Diamonds worth a quarter of a million! And yet already they werebeginning to hang like a millstone round Mr. Paxton's neck. The reliefwhich he felt at having got rid of them from his actual person provedto be but temporary. All day they haunted him. Having done the onething which he had come to town to do, he found himself unoccupied. Heavoided the neighbourhood of the Stock Exchange, and of his usualhaunts, for reasons. Eries were still declining. The differenceagainst him had assumed a portentous magnitude. Possibly, confidingbrokers were seeking for him high and low, anxious for security whichwould protect them against the necessity of having to make good hislosses. No, just then the City was not for him. Discretion, of a sort,suggested his confining himself to the West-end of town.

  Unfortunately, in this case, the West-end meant loitering about barsand similar stimulating places. He drank not only to kill time butalso to drown his thoughts, and the more he tried to drown them, themore they floated on the surface.

  What a fool he had been--what an egregious fool! How he had exchangedhis talents for nothing, and for less than nothing. How he had thrownaway his prospects, his opportunities, his whole life, his all! Andnow, by way of a climax, he had been guilty of a greater folly thanany which had gone before. He had sold more than his birthright forless--much less--than a mess of pottage. He had lost his soul for theprivilege of being able to hang a millstone round his neck--casthonour to the winds for the sake of encumbering himself with a burdenwhich would crush him lower and lower, until it laid him level withthe dust.

  Wherever he went, the story of the robbery met his eyes. The latestnews of it was announced on the placards of the evening papers.Newsboys bawled it in his ears. He had only to listen to what wasbeing said by the other frequenters of the bars against which helounged to learn that it was the topic of conversation on everytongue. All England, all Europe, indeed, one might say that the wholeof the civilised world was on tiptoe to catch the man who had donethis thing. As John Ireland had said, he might as soon think of beingable to sell the diamonds as of being able to sell the Koh-i-Nor.Every one who knew anything at all of precious stones was on thelook-out for them, from pole to pole. During his lifetime he would noteven venture to attempt their disposal, any attempt of the kind wouldinevitably involve his being instantaneously branded as a felon.

  Last night, when he left London, he had had something over two hundredpounds in his pockets. Except debts, and certain worthless securities,for which no one would give him a shilling, it was all he had left inthe world. It was not a large sum, but it was sufficient to take himto the other side of the globe, and to keep him there until he had hadtime to turn himself round, and to find some means of earning forhimself his daily bread. He had proposed to go on to Southampton thismorning, thence straight across the seas. Now what was it he proposedto do? Every day that he remained in England meant making furtherinroads into his slender capital. At the rate at which he was living,it would rapidly dwindle all away. Then how did he intend to replenishit? By selling the duchess's diamonds? Nonsense! He told himself, withbitter frankness, that such an idea was absolute nonsense; that such aprospect was as shadowy as, and much more dangerous than, theproverbial mirage of the desert.

  He returned by an afternoon train to Brighton, in about as black amood as he could be. He sat in a corner of a crowded compartment--forsome reason he rather shirked travelling alone--communing with thedemons of despair who seemed to be the tenants of his brain; fightingwith his own particular wild beasts. Arrived at Brighton withoutadventure, he drove straight to Makell's Hotel.

  As he advanced into the hall, the manager came towards him out of theoffice.

  "Good evening, Mr. Paxton. Did you authorise any one to come and fetchaway your bag?"

  "No. Why?"

  "Some fellow came and said that you had sent him for your Gladstonebag."

  "I did nothing of the kind. Did you give it him?"

  The manager smiled.

  "Hardly. You had confided it to my safe keeping, and I was scarcelylikely to hand it to a stranger who was unable to present a moresufficient authority than he appeared to have. We make it a rule thatarticles entrusted to our charge are returned to the owners only, onpersonal application."

  "What sort of a man was he to look at?"

  "Oh, a shabby-looking chap, very much down at heel indeed,middle-aged; the sort of man whom you would expect would runmessages."

  "Tell me, as exactly as you can, what it was he said."

  "He said that Mr. Paxton had sent him for his Gladstone bag. I askedhim where you were. He said you were at Medina Villas, and you wantedyour bag. You had given him a shilling to come for it, and you were togive him another shilling when he took it back. I told him our rulereferring to property deposited with us by guests, and he made off."

  Medina Villas? Miss Strong resided in Medina Villas, and MissWentworth; with which fact Mr. Lawrence was possibly acquainted. Oncemore in this latest dash for the bag Mr. Paxton seemed to trace thatgentleman's fine Roman hand. He thanked the manager for the care whichhe had taken of his interests.

  "I'm glad that you sent the scamp empty away, but, between you and me,the loss wouldn't have been a very serious one if you had given himwhat he wanted. I took all that the bag contained of value up with meto town, and left it there."

  The manager looked at him, as Mr. Paxton felt, a triflescrutinisingly, as if he could not altogether make him out.

  "There seems to be a sort of dead set made at you. First, theattempted burglary last night--which is a kind of thing which hasnever before been known in the whole history of the hotel--and nowthis impudent rascal trying to make out that you had authorised him toreceive your Gladstone bag. One might almost think that you werecarrying something about with you which was of unique importance, andthat the fact of your doing so had somehow become known to aconsiderable proportion of our criminal population."

  Mr. Paxton laughed. He had the bag carried upstairs, telling himselfas he went that it was already more than time that his sojourn atMakell's Hotel should be brought to a conclusion.

  He ate a solitary dinner, lingering over it, though he had but ascanty appetite, as long as he could, in order to while away the timeuntil the hour came for meeting Daisy. Towards the end of the meal,sick to death of his own thoughts, for sheer want of something else todo, he took up an evening paper, which he had brought into the roomwith him, and which was lying on a chair at his side, and began toglance at it. As he idly skimmed its columns, all at once a paragraphin the City article caught his eye. He read the words with a feelingof surprise; then, with increasing amazement, he read them again.

  "The boom in the shares of the Trumpit Gold Mine continues. On thestrength of a report that the reef which has been struck is ofimportance, the demand for them, even at present prices, exceeded thesupply. When our report left, buyers were offering L10--the highestprice of the day."

  After subjecting the paragraph to a second reading, Mr. Paxton put thepaper down upon his knees, and gasped for breath. It was a mistake--acanard--quite incredible. Trumpits selling at L10--it could not be! Hewould have been glad, quite lately, to have sold his for 10d each;only he was conscious that even at that price he would have found nobuyer. L10 indeed! It was a price of which, at one time, he haddreamed--but it had remained a dream.

  He read the paragraph again. So far as the paper was concerned, thereseemed to be no doubt about it--there it was in black and white. Thepaper was one of the highest standing, of unquestionable authority,not given to practical jokes--especially in the direction ofquotations in its City article. Could the thing be true? He felt thatsomething was tingling all over his body. On a sudden, his pulses hadbegun to beat like sledge-hammers. He rose from his seat, just as thewaiter was placing still another plate in front of him, and, to theobvious surprise of that well-trained functionary, he marched awaywithout a word. He made for the smoking-roo
m. He knew that he shouldfind the papers there. And he found them, morning and eveningpapers--even some of the papers of the day before--as many as hewished. He ransacked them all. Each, with one accord, told the sametale.

  The thing might be incredible, but it was true!

  While he was gambling in Eries, losing all, and more than all, that hehad; while he was gambling in stolen jewels, losing all that was leftof his honour too, a movement had been taking place in the marketwhich was making his fortune for him all the time, and he had notnoticed it. The thing seemed to him to be almost miraculous. Andcertainly it was not the least of the miracles which lately had comehis way.

  Some two years before a friend had put him on--as friends do put uson--to a real good thing--the Trumpit Gold Mine. The friend professedto have special private information about this mine, and Mr. Paxtonbelieved that he had. He still believed that he thought he had. Mr.Paxton was not a greenhorn, but he was a gambler, which now and thenis about as bad. He looked at the thing all round--in the light of hisfriend's special information!--as far as he could, and as time wouldpermit, and it seemed to him to be good enough for a plunge. Theshares just then were at a discount--a considerable discount. From onepoint of view it was the time to buy them--and he did. He got togetherpretty well every pound he could lay his hands on, and bought tenthousand--bought them out and out, to hold--and went straight off andtold Miss Strong he had made his fortune. It was only the mistake of aword--what he ought to have told her was that he had lost it. Thecertainly expected find of yellow ore did not come off, nor did thelooked-for rise in the shares come off either. They continued at adiscount, and went still lower. Purchasers could not be discovered atany price.

  It was a bitter blow. Almost, if not quite, as bitter a blow to MissStrong as to himself. Indeed, Mr. Paxton had felt ever since as ifMiss Strong had never entirely forgiven him for having made such afool of her. He might--he could not help fancying that some such lineof reasoning had occupied her attention more than once--before tellingher of the beautiful chickens which were shortly about to be hatched,at least have waited till the eggs were laid.

  He had been too much engaged in other matters to pay attention toquotations for shares, which had long gone unquoted, and which he had,these many days, regarded as a loss past praying for. It appeared thatrumours had come of gold in paying quantities having been found; thatthe rumours had gathered strength; that, in consequence, the shareshad risen, until, on a sudden, the market was in a frenzy--asoccasionally the market is apt to be--and ten pounds a-piece was beingoffered. Ten thousand at ten pounds a-piece--why, it was a hundredthousand pounds! A fortune in itself!

  By the time Mr. Paxton had attained to something like an adequate ideaof the situation, he was half beside himself with excitement. Helooked at his watch--it was time for meeting Daisy. He hurried intothe hall, crammed on his hat, and strode into the street.

  Scarcely had he taken a dozen steps, when some one struck him aviolent blow from behind. As he turned to face his assailant, an armwas thrust round his neck, and what felt like a damp cloth was forcedagainst his mouth. He was borne off his feet, and, in spite of hisstruggles, was conveyed with surprising quickness into a cab which wasdrawn up against the kerb.