CHAPTER XXI
THE CHINESE GENTLEMAN
I could not repress an unconscious, involuntary start on hearing this remarkable declaration; it seemed to open, as widely as suddenly, an entirely new field of vision; it was as if some hand had abruptly torn aside a veil and shown me something that I had never dreamed of. And Baxter laughed, significantly.
"That strikes you, Middlebrook?" he said.
"Very forcibly, indeed!" said I. "If what you say is true—I mean, if one of those two men had such valuables on him, then there's a reason for the murder of both that none of us knew of. But—is it probable that the Quicks would still be in possession of jewels that you saw some years ago?"
"Not so many years ago, when all's said and done," he answered. "And you couldn't dispose of things like those very readily, you know. You can take it from me, knowing what I did of them, that neither Noah nor Salter Quick would sell anything unless at its full value, or something like it. They weren't hard up for money, either of them; they could afford to wait, in the matter of a sale of anything, until they found somebody who would give their price."
"You say these things—rubies, I think—were worth a lot of money?" I asked.
"Heaps of money!" he affirmed. "Do you know anything about rubies? Not much?—well, the ruby, I daresay you do know, is the most precious of precious stones. The real true ruby, the Oriental one, is found in greatest quantity in Burma and Siam, and the best are those that come from Mogok, which is a district lying northward of Mandalay. These rubies that the Quicks had came from there—they were remarkably fine ones. And I know how and where those precious villains got them!"