The Danvers Jewels, and Sir Charles Danvers | Page 5

you," I said, significantly.
"But where?"
He was simpler than even I could have believed.
"My dear boy," I said, hardly able to refrain from laughing, "do as I do; put them in a bag with a string to it. Put the string round your neck, and wear that bag under your clothes night and day."
"At night as well?" he asked, anxiously.
"Of course. You are just as likely to lose them, as you call it, in the night as in the day."
"I'm very much obliged to you," he replied. "I will take your advice this very night. I say," he added, suddenly, "you would not care to see them, would you? I would not have any one else catch sight of them for a good deal, but I would show you them in a moment. Every one else is on deck just now, if you would like to come down into my cabin."
I hardly know one stone from another, and never could tell a diamond from paste; but he seemed so anxious to show me what he had, that I did not like to refuse.
"By all means," I said. And we went below.
It was very dark in Carr's cabin, and after he had let me in he locked the door carefully before he struck a light. He looked quite pale in the light of the lamp after the red dusk of the warm evening on deck.
"I don't want to have other fellows coming in," he said in a whisper, nodding at the door.
He stood looking at me for a moment as if irresolute, and then he suddenly seemed to arrive at some decision, for he pulled a small parcel out of his pocket and began to open it.
They really were not much to look at, though I would not have told him so for worlds. There were a few sapphires--one of a considerable size, but uncut--and some handsome turquoises, but not of perfect color. He turned them over with evident admiration.
"They will look lovely, set in gold, as a bracelet on her arm," he said, softly. He was very much in love, poor fellow! And then he added, humbly, "But I dare say they are nothing to yours."
I chuckled to myself at the thought of his astonishment when he should actually behold them; but I only said, "Would you like to see them, and judge for yourself?"
"Oh! if it is not giving you too much trouble," he exclaimed, gratefully, with shining eyes. "It's very kind of you. I did not like to ask. Have you got them with you?"
I nodded, and proceeded to unbutton my coat.
At that moment a voice was heard shouting down the companion-ladder: "Carr! I say, Carr, you are wanted!" and in another moment some one was hammering on the door.
Carr sprang to his feet, looking positively savage.
"Carr!" shouted the voice again. "Come out, I say; you are wanted!"
"Button up your coat," he whispered, scowling suddenly; and with an oath he opened the door.
Poor Carr! He was quite put out, I could see, though he recovered himself in a moment, and went off laughing with the man, who had been sent for him to take his part in a rehearsal which had been suddenly resolved on; for theatricals had been brewing for some time, and he had promised to act in them. I had not been asked to join, so I saw no more of him that night. The following morning, as I was taking an early turn on the deck, he joined me, and said, with a smile, as he linked his arm in mine, "I was put out last night, wasn't I?"
"But you got over it in a moment," I replied. "I quite admired you; and, after all, you know--some other time."
"No," he said, smiling still, "not some other time. I don't think I will see them--thanks all the same. They might put me out of conceit with what I have picked up for my little girl, which are the best I can afford."
He seemed to have lost all interest in the subject, for he began to talk of England, and of London, about which he appeared to have that kind of vague half-and-half knowledge which so often proves misleading to young men newly launched into town life. When he found out, as he soon did, that I was, to a certain extent, familiar with the metropolis, he began to question me minutely, and ended by making me promise to dine with him at the Criterion, of which he had actually never heard, and go with him afterwards to the best of the theatres the day after we arrived in London.
He wanted me to go with him the very evening we arrived, but on that point I was firm. My sister Jane, who was living with a hen