"Nay, Edward, think but a moment--What care would any feel for news of you did they not suspect something? Who cares whither I go or what I do? If you were but the obscure stranger you pass for, who would trouble to heed whither your steps were bent or how your time was passed? As you came in just now, did any man see you pass the threshold?" "Nay, I know not. I was heeding little in the street. It was dark enough in the narrow alley, darker than it is up here; but--" "Wait, Edward, answer me one question yet. Is it possible that the peddler can have any clue by which he may know you? Did you betray aught to him that evening when you bartered with him for your suit of clothes? How did you pay him? Was it in French gold?" "Nay, I paid him no money at all. I gave him a pearl clasp which I had, and he furnished me with funds for the journey to London. I made a villainous bad bargain, it seems. The other jewels I have disposed of in London I have got far better price for. "Now, Paul, why look you so troubled and wan? Have you yet another lecture in store for your luckless comrade?" "O Edward, Edward," cried Paul in anxious tones, "is it really so? Have you been mad enough to sell jewels which may be known and traced? Did I not tell you from the very first that I had money enough for both? You should not have done it. And why, if done it must be, did you not tell me, and let me do the trafficking?" Edward smiled as he laid his hand upon his comrade's shoulder. "Good Paul, did you think that I would trade upon your love, to filch from you the remains of that poor fortune which is all you have left of the world's goods? I knew how readily your all would have been laid at my feet; but it was not for me to accept the sacrifice when I had means of raising money myself. And what danger can there be? My mother's jewels can scarce be known here. I fear your courage is but a sorry thing, you are so prone to idle fears and gloomy portents." "Heaven grant I may be deceived; But the pearl clasp of which you speak--tell me what it was like." "Why, a fine pearl set in a clasp of chased gold with an eagle in relief, the claws forming the catch of the clasp. My royal mother had a pair of them once; what befell the other I remember not. It was lost, I have heard her say, long years ago." Paul clasped his hands closely together. "Edward," he said, "it was just such a clasp as that which fastened the jewelled collar of the little Prince of Wales on the day when he, in play, fastened that collar about my neck, which collar fell a prey to certain robbers who carried off the humble knight's son in mistake for the prince.