Work was never carried on during the middle of the day, and it was not till three o'clock in the afternoon that he returned.
Isbel had prepared his midday meal for him, and he left her behind, putting things in order. He had scarcely spoken to her, judging that in her present humor it was better to say nothing and trust to time and the absence of Schumer to soothe her feelings. He knew little of the mentality of Isbel. Arrived at the fishing grounds, he set to with Sru on a heap of shells that lay awaiting treatment.
The size of the oysters to be dealt with varied considerably. Nothing, indeed, varies much more than the size of the pearl oysters as taken in the different fisheries of the world. In some places the oysters are so small that from three to four thousand go to make a ton; in others they are so large that a ton weight of them only runs to four or five hundred. Occasionally gigantic specimens are obtained, weighing from fourteen to sixteen pounds, bare shells.
The largest of these oysters being handled by Floyd and Sru would have scaled a thousand to the ton, perhaps, and the medium size about fifteen hundred.
The afternoon work was scarcely more fruitful than the morning. It began with the capture of two small, but almost perfect, pearls, globular in shape, but weighing, perhaps, less than fifteen grains. These were taken in the first fifteen minutes, and then for the next three hours nothing showed but slush and slime.
The oysters one after the other were cleared out into the canvas trough with a sweep of the finger. Each pair of shells were then examined for adhering pearls or blisters, and flung aside if showing neither. Then, when sufficient putrefying matter had been collected in the troughs, it was carefully washed away and searched.
The shells cast aside were collected by two of the men and stored.
It was just at sunset, and at the washing of the last lot, that Floyd, groping in the seaweed-colored and viscous mass in the trough, felt his fingers closing upon a pebble. From the size of the object, he fancied for a second that it was a pebble. Instantly, and before he had brought it to light, he knew it to be a pearl.
It was. A perfectly round pearl, of enormous size, at least enormous in comparison with all the pearls he had hitherto seen. But it was not till he had cleansed it of slime in the bucket of water which Sru held for him that he saw what a prize he had obtained.
It was near sunset, and the golden light, mellow and tremulous, that was illuminating the sea and turning the west to flame, lit the treasure lying in the palm of his hand.