"Oh, confound it, if I can't get at my oysters!" he complained, leaning back into his group again with a sigh.
"You divide the honors with the mysterious unknown, eh?" Kerr inquired across the table.
"Hang it, there's no division! I'd offer you a share!" Harry laughed, and it occurred to Flora how much Kerr could have made of it.
"Purdie'd like to share something," Buller vouchsafed. "He's been pawing the air ever since Crew cabled, and this has blown him up completely."
"Crew?" Flora wondered. Here was something more happening. Crew? She had not heard that name before. It made a stir among them all; but if Kerr looked sharp, Clara looked sharper. She looked at Harry and Harry was vexed.
"Who's Crew?" said Ella; and the judge looked around on the silence.
"Why, bless my soul, isn't it—Oh, anyway, it will all be out to-morrow. But I thought Harry'd told you. The Chatworth ring wasn't Bessie's."
It had the effect of startling them all apart, and then drawing them closer together again around the table over the uncorked bottles.
"Why," Judge Buller went on, "this ring is a celebrated thing. It's the 'Crew Idol'!" He threw the name out as if that in itself explained everything, but the three women, at least, were blank.
"Why celebrated?" Clara objected. "The stones were only sapphires."