Even as he spoke, his eye caught a steadfast gleam that shone from the edge of the sunken water. For a moment he thought that it was but one of the runes of flame that played over the reflecting surface of the lake, but this was steady, not suddenly kindled and consumed. Then in a flash the truth of the matter was his: the leather case had rotted and fallen away in the water. Here, within a foot of the edge of the lake, lay his Luck.
He disjoined himself from the others, took one step forward and bent down. With a reluctant cluck the mud gave up the jewel, and he held it high, growing each moment more resplendent as the ooze dripped sullenly from it. The great diamonds awoke, they winked and blazed, sunset and moon and evening star were reflected there, and who knows what authentic fires of hell? There was a glow of sapphire, a glimmer of pearl, a gleam of gold. But two steps more took Harry on to the stone slab that covered the sluice, and there on the scene of one of its crimes he laid the priceless thing. Then, as a man with his heel crushes the life out of some poisonous creeping horror, he stamped and stamped on it, and stamped yet again. This way and that flew the jewels; diamond and sapphire were dust; the pearls, unbroken, leaped like flicked peas, some into the lake, others into the outflowing thunder of the sluice. Then, taking the crumbled and shapeless remnant, he flung it far into mid water.
"And the curse is gone from the house!" he cried.