After I'd promised, he opened the bag and showed me what was
in it. It was full of precious stones--diamonds, rubies, and the like;
some of them as large as birds' eggs. I can see him now, propped up
against the boat and playing with them in the sunlight. They blazed like
stars. Half a million he put them at, or more."
"What good could they be to him when he was dead?" inquired the listener.
Captain Bowers shook his head. "That was his business, not mine," he
replied. "It was nothing to do with me. When he died I dug a grave for
him, as I told you, with a bit of a broken oar, and laid him and the bag
together. A month afterwards I was taken off by a passing schooner and
landed safe at Sydney."
Mr. Chalk stopped, and mechanically picking up the pieces of his pipe
placed them on the table.
"Suppose that you had heard afterwards that the things had been stolen?"
he remarked.
"If I had, then I should have given information, I think," said the
other. "It all depends."
"Ah! but how could you have found them again?" inquired Mr. Chalk, with
the air of one propounding a poser.
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