“Rings?” asked Bob. “Oh, those. A Chinaman back in San Francisco gave them to us.”
“Let me take a good look at them,” said the stranger, whose name was Walker.
He examined the rings carefully for several minutes.
“Why?” asked Joe. “Is there anything wrong?”
“Wrong? Absolutely not,” Walker said, straightening up with a nod. “You fellows are most fortunate in possessing such rare pieces of jewelry. Those rings once belonged to an emperor of China.”
“What!” cried Bob, while Joe’s eyes opened wide. “How do you know this?”
“By the inscriptions that are on them,” Walker returned at once.
“Inscriptions?” Bob looked baffled. “Can you read those?”
“Most assuredly,” was the answer. “I can speak and read seven languages. Chinese is one of them.”
At once the youths were all excitement.