“I don’t doubt you, Beverley, but I must point out to you that you have forgotten one trifling circumstance in your very engaging explanation. The necklace belongs to your father.”
“I c-consider it’s family property. It’s folly to keep it w-when we’re all of us aground! D-damn it, I was forced to take the thing! You don’t know w-what it is to be in the p-power of a d-damned cent-per-cent! If the old m-man would have p-parted, this wouldn’t have happened! I told him a m-month ago I hadn’t a feather to fly with, but the old fox wouldn’t c-come up to scratch. I tell you, I’ve no c-compunction! He lectured me as though he himself w-weren’t under hatches, which, by God, he is! Deep b-basset’s been his ruin; m-myself, I prefer to g-go to perdition with a d-dice-box.” He gave a reckless laugh, and suddenly sat down on the moss-covered stump of a felled tree, and buried his face in his hands.
“You are forgetting women, wine, and horses,” said Sir Richard unemotionally. “They also have played not inconsiderable roles in this dramatic progress of yours. Three years ago you were once again under the hatches. I forget what it cost to extricate you from your embarrassments, but I do seem to recall that you gave your word you would not again indulge in—er—quite so many excesses.”
“Well, I’m n-not expecting you to raise the w-wind for me this time,” said Beverley sulkily.
“What’s the figure?” Sir Richard asked.
“How should I know? I’m n-not a damned b-banking clerk! T-twelve thousand or so, I dare say. If you hadn’t spoiled my g-game, I c-could have settled the whole thing.”
“You delude yourself. When I encountered your friend Yarde he was making for the coast with the diamonds in his pocket.”
“Where are they now?”
“In my pocket,” Sir Richard said coolly.
Beverley lifted his head. “L-listen, Richard, you’re not a b-bad fellow! Who’s to know you ever had the d-diamonds in your hands? It ain’t your affair: give them to m-me, and forget all about the rest! I swear I’ll n-never breathe a w-word to a soul!”