"Because," she told him, "my name is Ruby Sinclair, and I am here on very much the same errand as you, only with this difference," she added,--"I know where my uncle is. I know what has become of him. There are other things for which I seek." He came over from the window, and stood on the hearthrug by her side. Some part of her excitement had become communicated to him. "I say," he exclaimed, "this is a rum go, and no mistake! If it's the same man, we may be able to help one another. It's Richard Sinclair I am looking for, called over there Bully Sinclair. He was a man about fifty years old, been in South Africa for the last twenty years, a mine prospector and general adventurer. He'd had his fingers in a good many pies, had Richard." "What was he over in England for?" she asked. The young man hesitated. "I don't know that there's any harm in telling you," he said, "only remember its information for information. I'm giving you the whole show away." "I'll tell you all you want to know," she interrupted. "Go on." "Well," the young man said, "he came over to lay claim to a gold-mine that he considered he'd been done out of." "A gold-mine!" the girl repeated breathlessly. "Was it a rich one--very rich, I mean?" "I should say so," the young man answered. "It was a complicated bit of business--the mine's in other hands, you see--but Sinclair reckoned that he'd got a claim to it, anyway, and he expected either to be squared for a big amount, or to get a syndicate to take the thing up. He came to me dead on his uppers. My name's Hefferom. He and I had been pretty thick at odd times, and though we'd been in a good many deals together, we'd kept friends in a way. He came to me, as I say, in Cape Town, and he told me what the game was. He wanted a matter of two or three hundred pounds to get over to this side, and to start things properly. Well, I thought it out, and though it was about all I was worth in the world, I let him have it. Over he comes. I got a letter from him to say he'd landed, and never another line. I cabled--no answer. Over I came myself, for he'd scarcely left Cape Town before a little affair that I was mixed up in went plumb wrong, and I lost every penny I'd got left. So over here I come, and I've been here a fortnight, and I tell you Sinclair seems to have vanished from the face of the earth. The worst of it is," he continued, "I'm stoney-broke. I've got to leave this place to-day because I can't pay my bill, and I've no idea where to raise a sovereign." The girl's sense of humor triumphed for a second over her excitement. "There are your diamonds," she reminded him. "I heard you talking about them at dinner the other night. One of them you said was worth a hundred pounds."