I was digging as I spoke, spading up the loose soil in big lumps, and throwing it out of the way. The Marquis, again with his Marquisatorial air, took up the other spade, and joined in. I told him not to worry, but he insisted.
“It would not be fitting a gentleman of France, if I should let you commit this sin for me, and not sin also,” he said. I thought that if the measure of his iniquity were to be calculated by the amount of digging he got through, it needn’t trouble his conscience much; but I said nothing, even when he caught a crab with his spade, and fell almost on top of me. It pleased him, and did not harm any one—least of all, in my opinion, the poor black wretch below.
In a very few minutes our spades struck something. I felt about in the soil, and touched a soft, indefinite mass. Exploring carefully, I found, to my astonishment, that, whatever else I might discover in the grave, there was no heavy metal helmet and corselet. It was imperative to strike a light now, no matter what the risk, and I took out a little bit of candle I had brought with me.
There is no need to say exactly what I saw, or detail anything I may have done. It was a brief business. Almost at once, I understood that the grave had been opened, as I had feared; that the body had been removed from the helmet and corselet with considerable violence, and that, whatever else there might be in the ravaged tomb of Mo, ex-sorcerer of Kata-Kata town, diamond there was none.
You might think that the Marquis and I would have been knocked over by this. We weren’t a bit. We were disappointed; but we had been disappointed about the sorcerer’s stone before, and the chances of getting it were not much worse now than they had been on our arrival. Samarai, a very small island, with every one in sight of every one else all the time, and no calling steamer due, was about as good a hunting-ground as one could wish for. And, anyhow, I didn’t mean to lose heart, if things looked twice as black. So I told the Marquis, and he agreed with me. He even offered to prove how little he was discouraged by doing the war-dance of the priests in “Athalie” all the way back to the shore. I told him I had always reckoned it was a march, and he explained he would do the dance they ought to have done, and didn’t.
As I wanted to return as quickly as possible, I persuaded him to put off the performance until we had got back to the town. I thought he would have forgotten it by that time, but he hadn’t. The spectacle of the Marquis, in a very dirty singlet and trousers and bare, sandy feet, doing the war-dance of the priests by starlight all down the main street of Samarai at two o’clock in the morning is one of the things that I expect to remember all the rest of my life.
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The spectacle of the Marquis, in a dirty singlet and trousers, and bare feet, doing the war-dance of the priests in “Athalie” in the main street at two o’clock in the morning, is one of the things I expect to remember all the rest of my life
Next morning, as might have been expected, we were both suffering from the sort of mental sore-head that follows after great excitement, and in consequence were somewhat depressed. We walked round and round the island, chafing, as every one in Samarai chafes, at its narrow confines, and discussing the affair of the diamond ceaselessly. I don’t think I shall ever see green palms on a white shore again, or smell the dank, weedy smell of a coral reef, without thinking of diamonds and divers and graves. We talked it over inside and out, and upside down, and arrived at the following conclusion: