“That night in my room at the Adams House I learned the secret of the doll—the secret Jones was to reveal to me when we met. I also learned that I had committed a crime. This doll looks pretty and expensive, does it not? Well, Mr. Merriwell, I’ll wager you can’t guess how much it is worth.”
Frank shrugged his shoulders.
“Ten dollars, perhaps,” he said.
“Ten thousand, if a cent!” declared Hilda Dugan.
He wondered if she could be in her right mind.
“I knew you would stare!” she laughed excitedly, her face flushed and her hands trembling. “But you will stare still more when I show you the secret of the doll. Look!”
She opened the doll’s dress, exposing the body, and then, as she touched a hidden spring, a coverlike lid flew upward.
The doll lay on its back across Hilda’s knees, and a cry broke from Frank as he stared at it, for he saw that its body was literally stuffed with glittering diamonds!