“Mrs. Hughes?”
“It seems so to me,” continued Mr. James. “Little, pale, and lady-like: that is just what she was.”
“Dear me!” cried Miss Deveen, letting her hands drop on her lap as if they had lost their power. “You had better tell me as much as you can recollect, please.”
“It was at dusk,” said Mr. James. “Not quite dark, but the lamps were lighted in the streets and the gas indoors: just the hour, ma’am, that gentlefolk choose for bringing their things to us. I happened to be standing near the door, when a lady came into the shop and asked to see the principal. I said I was he, and retired behind the counter. She brought out these emerald studs”—touching the box—“and said she wanted to sell them, or pledge them for their utmost value. She told me a tale, in apparent confidence, of a brother who had fallen into debt at college, and she was trying to get together some money to help him, or frightful trouble might come of it. If it was not genuine,” broke off Mr. James, “she was the best actor I ever saw in all my life.”
“Please go on.”
“I saw the emeralds were very rare and beautiful. She said they were an heirloom from her mother, who had brought the stones from India and had them linked together in England. I told her I could not buy them; she rejoined that it might be better only to pledge them, for they would not be entirely lost to her, and she might redeem them ere twelve months had passed if I would keep them as long as that. I explained that the law exacted it. The name she gave was Mary Drake, asking if I had ever heard of the famous old forefather of theirs, Admiral Drake. The name answers to the initials on the gold.”
“‘M. D.’ They were engraved for Margaret Deveen. Perhaps she claimed the crest, also, Mr. James,” added that lady, sarcastically.
“She did, ma’am; in so far as that she said it was the crest of the Drake family.”
“And you call her a lady?”
“She had every appearance of one, in tone and language too. Her hand—she took one of her gloves off when showing the studs—was a lady’s hand; small, delicate, and white as alabaster. Ma’am, rely upon it, though she may not be a lady in deeds, she must be living the life of one.”