“Is this,” he said, “the same you gave to your mother? Can you identify it?”
“It is the same. There is the bulged eyelid and the chalk-marks yet about it.”
“The stone may have dropped out. We can show you no better consideration, Dennis, than to begin and end the search here and now.”
Luvaine was on his knees already, diving into and scattering the little heap of bones and implements. He found nothing there; nor could any of them, after the most exhaustive search, discover a trace of the missing gem. The candle on the wall guttered and flared down while they were at work, and Dennis replaced it with another from a little bundle he had brought with him. He had made it one of his duties, it seemed, to supply these to the lonely woman.
Suddenly Luvaine rose to his feet with an evil expression of face.
“This is trouble thrown away,” he said. “There is one and one only likely place to overhaul.”
Dennis cried “No, no!” with an agonized look.
“Whimple,” said his master gently—“these are great stakes at issue, and to curtail the search would be to place me at least in a very false position. Let it be done with all reverence, by your hands.”
The servant knelt beside the body with a stifled groan. As he did so, a common impulse led Tuke and his friend to hastily block the soldier’s path. The maniac did not interfere; but he glanced over their shoulders, gnawing his knuckles and jerking his every limb in a fury of impatience.
“There is nothing on this poor body,” said Dennis, after a pause, looking up. “Almost as little without as within, poor soul.”