"S-sh!" said Horace, drawing him back into the room. "It's all right. They're diamonds!"
"Hurrah!" Fred shouted wildly.
"They were awfully keen to know where I got them, but of course I wouldn't tell, except that it was in Ontario. They would have bought the lot, I think, but I wasn't anxious to sell at once. They wanted me to make a price, and I wanted them to make an offer, and both of us were afraid, I guess. However, they're going to take care of the stones for me and think it over."
"We must tell the other boys!" exclaimed Fred. "Can you make the slightest guess at what the stones are worth?"
"Hardly—at present. Maybe a thousand or two. Three of them are too small to be of any use at all, too small to be cut. The biggest has a bad flaw in it; it could be used only for cutting up into what they call 'commercial diamonds,' for watch-movements, and such things. Yes, give Peter and Maurice the news, certainly, but do it by word of mouth. Don't 'phone them. You don't know who may be listening.
"And be sure to warn them to keep the whole affair the closest kind of secret. Wilson & Keith are going to exhibit the stones in their show window, and you've no idea what an excitement will be stirred up. We'll all be watched. People will try in every possible way to find out where we got them. The newspapers will be after the story, and there'll be all kinds of underhand tricks to trap us into letting out something. Not that it would do much good, for none of you know enough to be dangerous, but we don't want a dozen parties going up the Nottaway River next spring. We 're going there ourselves."
Fred promised secrecy, and presently found that his brother had hardly exaggerated the sensation caused by the little pile of dull stones on a square of black velvet in the jeweler's window, labeled "Canadian Diamonds." The newspapers were unremitting; Horace gave them a brief and circumspect interview, and thenceforth refused to add another word to his statement. He was besieged with inquiries. He had all sorts of proposals made to him by miners and mining firms. One group of capitalists made him an offer that he thought good enough to consider for a day, but he ultimately rejected it.
Fred had his share of glory too, as the brother of the diamond finder. It leaked out that Maurice and Peter had also been on the expedition, and they were so pestered with inquiries and interviewers that it seriously interfered with their collegiate work. But by degrees the excitement wore off, for lack of anything further to feed upon. The diamonds were withdrawn from exhibition, and the jewelers at last made up their minds to offer Horace seven hundred dollars for the lot.
It was rather a disappointing figure. Horace took his diamonds to Montreal and submitted them to two jewel experts there, who advised him that they were probably worth little more, in their uncut form. The cutting of them might develop flaws, or it might bring out unexpected luster; it was taking a chance.
Returning to Toronto, he announced that he would take eight hundred and no less; and after some arguing Wilson & Keith consented to pay that price. The boys had a grand dinner at a downtown restaurant that night to celebrate it. It was far from the fortune they had hoped to gain, but they still had great hopes of discovering that fortune.