Almost reverently he replaced the ball in the cotton-lined case and closed the lid. Returning to his bench, he resumed his original position, sweeping an amused glance around him at the awed faces of Goldstein, Pryne, and Matt.
"Armed with one of the balls of Ptah," he proceeded, "I picked up the ancient mariner"—he nodded toward Bunce—"and we manufactured a silk ladder twenty feet long, and weighted it at one end. Then, one day, we repaired to the Honam Joss House at five in the afternoon. That ball of Egyptian glass, crushed to fragments on the floor, overcame the priests. Bunce and I protected our own faces with masks, equipped with oxygen tubes reaching into small tanks of compressed air in our pockets. To throw the weighted end of the ladder over the head of Ptah took us possibly a minute; for me to climb the ladder and dig the ruby from the idol's forehead consumed possibly five minutes; and for Bunce and me to get out of the temple took five minutes more. We were safely out of Canton when the storm broke."
Matt had listened to all this in supreme wonder. The audacity of the undertaking caused his pulses to stir, but he wondered why Grattan should recount such an exploit to him, and in the hearing of Pryne and Goldstein.
"You know now," continued Grattan, "what the Eye of Buddha has cost me, and you say it is just barely possible I would be generous enough to yield the gem to Tsan Ti in order to save his life!"
"Or you might sell it to him," suggested Matt.
"I might, if he could pay what it is worth."
"Grattan," spoke up Goldstein with sudden fervor, "you have promised me der first shance!"
"Keep still!" growled Grattan. "You'll get all the chance you want before you leave here."
"The mandarin is a rich man," said Matt, who, of course, was parleying merely to gain time.
"He has a little money with him, but that is all. Every plantation he owns in China, every string of cash in his strong boxes is guarded by the regent. If he does not recover the Eye of Buddha, the property will be confiscated. And he can't touch a cent of his fortune until he returns the ruby to its place in the idol's head. So, you see, your friend, the mandarin of the red button, is in a bally hard fix. He can't buy the ruby, and certainly I won't give it to him."