“This is a very valuable diamond,” said Cosmo, looking closely at it.
“Then that shall be your share, Cosmo,” returned Joan. “I will keep this if you don’t mind.”
“What have you got?” asked Cosmo.
“My father’s signet-ring, I believe,” she answered. “I have often heard him—bemoan the loss of it.”
Lord Mergwain’s ring in the old captain’s stick! Things began to put themselves together in Cosmo’s mind. He lay thinking.
The old captain had won these rings from the young lord and put them for safety in the horse; Borland suspected, probably charged him with false play; they fought, and his lordship carried away the stick to recover his own; but had failed to find the rings, taking the boxes in the bamboo for all there was of stowage in it.
It was by degrees, however, that this theory formed itself in his mind; now he saw only a glimmer of it here and there.
In the meantime he was not a little disappointed. Was this all the great mystery of the berimed horse? It was as if a supposed opal had burst, and proved but a soap-bubble!
Joan sat silent, looking at the signet-ring, and the tears came slowly in her eyes.
“I may keep this ring, may I not, Cosmo?” she said.