The King of Diamonds: A Tale of Mystery and AdventureTracy, Louis
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The King of Diamonds: A Tale of Mystery and Adventure
Tracy, Louis
Detective and mystery stories; Fiction
"Quite true. The inference is that you have discovered a meteoric
deposit of diamonds."
"I have. Some--not all--are before you."
A tremor shook the court. Isaacstein swallowed something, and his head
sank more deeply below his shoulders.
"Then I take it that you will not inform me of the locality of this
deposit?"
"Yes."
"And you think that by disclosing your name and address you will reveal
that locality?"
Philip grew red.
"Is it fair," he said, with a curious iciness in his tone, "that a man
of your age should use his position and knowledge to try and trip a boy
who is brought before you on a false charge?"
It was the magistrate's turn to look slightly confused. There was some
asperity in his reply.
"I am not endeavoring to trip you, but rather to help you to free
yourself from a difficult position. However, do I understand that you
refuse to answer any questions?"
"I do." The young voice rang through the building with an amazing
fierceness.
Mr. Abingdon bent over the big book in front of him and scribbled
something.
"Remanded for a week," he muttered.
"Downstairs," growled the court jailer, and Philip disappeared from
sight. The magistrate was left gazing at the packet of diamonds, and he
called Isaacstein, the clerk of the court, and two police inspectors
into his private office for a consultation.
Meanwhile London was placarded with Philip's adventures that Saturday
evening. Contents bills howled in their blackest and biggest type,
newsvenders bawled themselves hoarse over this latest sensation,
journalistic ferrets combined theory and imagination in the effort to
spin out more "copy," Scotland Yard set its keenest detectives at work
to reveal the secret of Philip's identity, while Isaacstein, acting on
the magistrate's instructions, wrote to every possible source of
information in the effort to obtain some clew as to recent meteoric
showers.
No one thought of connecting the great storm with the "Diamond Mystery."
Meteors usually fall from a clear sky, and are in no way affected by
atmospheric disturbances, their normal habitat being far beyond the
influence of the earth's envelope of air.
And so the "hunt for the meteor" commenced, and was kept up with zest
for many days. "Have you found it?" became the stock question of the
humorist, and might be addressed with impunity to any stranger,
particularly if the stranger were a nice-looking girl. No one answered
"What?" because of the weird replies that were forthcoming.
The police failed utterly in their efforts to discover Philip's identity
or residence. Johnson's Mews, Mile End Road, might as well be in
Timbuctoo for all the relation it bore to Ludgate Hill or Hatton Garden.
An East End policeman might have recognized Philip had he seen him, but
the official description of his clothing and personal appearance applied
to thousands of hobbledehoys in every district of London.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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