Sandy, watching his friend’s face take on an eager light, a look of longing, decided that Mr. Whiteside could not have found a more certain way to fascinate Larry and enlist his cooperation.
Dick, too, showed an interested face.
“That would be great!” Larry declared. Then he became more serious, adding. “Finishing up my course would be fine, but if it means that I’d have to do anything against Mr. Everdail’s wishes, after he told us——”
“He wishes to recover those emeralds, my boy.”
“But he has agreed with Miss Serena that they are destroyed,” Dick objected.
“And I think they are not destroyed!”
He gave them his theory.
“When Everdail gave me all the facts he had about the London attempt to ruin the emeralds, the first idea I had was that some independent robber had failed to find the real gems and, in spite, had damaged the imitations.”
“But no other jewels were taken!”
That supported his decision that neither a single robber nor a band of miscreants had planned the affair. They would have taken all the real stones, and he believed that these were numerous.