this a joke?"
All the clerks guffawed in chorus. Fortunately, Isaacstein was in a good humor. He had just purchased a pearl for two hundred and fifty pounds, which he would sell to Lady Somebody for eight hundred pounds, to match another in an earring.
"It appears to be," said Philip, when the merriment had subsided.
For some reason the boy's grave, earnest eyes conquered the big little man's amused scrutiny.
"Now, boy, be quick. What is it?" he said, testily, and every clerk bent to his task.
"I have told you, sir. I wish to have a few minutes' conversation with you with regard to business of an important nature."
"You say Mr. Wilson sent you – Mr. Wilson, of Grant & Sons?"
"Yes, sir."
Isaacstein yielded to amazed curiosity.
"Step in here," he said, and led the way to his private office, surprising himself as well as his assistants by this concession.
Philip closed the door, and Isaacstein turned sharply at the sound, but the boy gave him no time to frame a question.
"I want you to buy this," he said, handing over the diamond.
Isaacstein took it, and gave it one critical glance. He began to wobble again.
"Do you mean to say Mr. Wilson sent you to dispose of this stone to me?" he demanded.
"Not exactly, sir. I showed it to him, and he recommended me to come to you."
"Ah, I see. Sit down, there – " indicating a chair near the door. The diamond merchant himself sat at his desk, but they were both in full view of each other.
"Where did you get it?" he asked.
"I found it."
"Quite so. But where?"
"At this moment I do not wish to go into details, but it is mine, mine only, and I am quite willing that you should make every inquiry to satisfy yourself that it was not stolen. I suppose that is what you fear?"
Sheer wonder kept the Jew silent for a space.
"Do you know its value?" he said, with a sudden snap.
"Mr. Wilson told me it was worth several hundreds of pounds."
"Did he, really?"
"Yes. He said you would treat me quite fairly, so I wish you to advance me a few pounds until you have decided upon its real price. You see, sir, I am very poor, and my present appearance creates an unfavorable impression. Still, I am telling you the absolute truth, and I show my confidence in you and in my own case by offering to leave the diamond with you on your receipt, together with a small sum of money."
Philip thought he was getting on very well. Isaacstein's large eyes bulged at him, and speech came but slowly. He leaned forward and rummaged among some papers. Then he opened a drawer and produced a magnifying glass, with which he focused the diamond.
"Yes, it is worth six or seven hundred pounds," he announced, "but it will be some time before I can speak accurately as to its value. I think it may be flawless, but that can only be determined when it is cut."
Philip's heart throbbed when he heard the estimate.
"Then I can have a few pounds – " he commenced.
"Steady. You are not in such a hurry; eh? You won't tell me where you got it?"
"I may, later, if you continue to deal with me as honestly as you have done already."
Isaacstein moved on his seat. Even in a chair he wanted to wobble. There was a slight pause.
"Have you any more like this stone? I suppose not, eh?"
"Yes, I have many more."
"Eh? What? Boy, do you know what you are saying?"
"No doubt you are surprised, sir, but not more than I am myself. Yet, it is true. I have some – as big again."
Philip, in his eagerness, nearly forgot his resolution to advance slowly. How the diamond merchant would shake if only he could see some of the white pebbles in the meteor.
"As big again! Where are they?"
The chair was creaking now with the rhythmic swaying of its occupant.
"Where this one came from, Mr. Isaacstein."
Philip smiled. He could not tell how it happened, but he felt that he was the intellectual superior of the man who sat there glowering at him so intently. Already the boy began to grasp dimly the reality of the power which enormous wealth would give him. Such people as the Jew and his satellites would be mere automata in the affairs of his life, important enough in a sense, with the importance of a stamp for a letter or a railway ticket for a journey, but governed and controlled utterly by the greater personage who could unlock the door of the treasure house. For the first time, Philip wished he was older, bigger, more experienced. He even found himself beginning to wonder what he should do until he reached man's estate. He sighed.
Isaacstein was watching him closely, trying to solve the puzzle by the aid of each trick and dodge known in a trade which lends itself to acute roguery of every description. The look of unconscious anxiety, of mental weariness, on Philip's face, seemed to clear away his doubts. He chuckled thickly.
"How many, now," he murmured. "Ten, twenty – of assorted sizes, eh?"
"Far more! Far more! Be content with what I tell you to-day, Mr. Isaacstein. I said my business was important. When you are better acquainted with me, I think you will find it sufficiently valuable to occupy the whole of your time."
Philip was ever on the verge of bursting out into confidences. His secret was too vast, too overpowering for a boy of fifteen. He wanted the knowledge and the trust of an older man. He did not realize that the Jew, beginning by regarding him as a thief, was now veering round to the opinion that he was a lunatic. For it is known to most men that the values of diamonds increase out of all proportion to their weight. While a one-carat stone is worth, roughly speaking, ten pounds, a twenty-carat gem of the same purity is worth any sum beyond two thousand pounds, and the diamond Philip had submitted for inspection would probably cut into ten or twelve carats of fine luster. To speak, therefore, of an abundance of larger and finer stones, was a simple absurdity. The De Beers Company alone could use such a figure of speech, and even then only at isolated dates in its history.
The boy, with his eyes steadfastly fixed on the Jew's face and yet with a distant expression in them that paid slight heed to the waves of emotion exhibited by the heavy cheeks and pursed-up mouth, awaited some final utterance on the part of his questioner. Surely he had said sufficient to make this man keenly alive to the commercial value of the "business" he offered. Under the conditions, Isaacstein could not refuse to give him sufficient money to meet his immediate wants.
The Jew, seemingly at a loss for words, bent again over the stone. He was scrutinizing it closely when a heavy tread crossed the outer showroom and the door was flung open.
A policeman entered, and Isaacstein bounced out of his chair.
"I have sent for you, constable, to take this boy into custody," he cried, excitedly. "He came here ten
