"I notice that their value steadily increases. The first time you saw this diamond"--and he held up the stone originally exhibited to the Jew--"you said it was worth six or seven hundred pounds. To-day you name a thousand. However, I will take your own valuation for this unimportant collection, and accept fifty thousand pounds." "Oh, you will, will you! And how will you have it, in notes or gold?" He could not help this display of cheap sarcasm. The situation was losing its annoyance; the humor of it was beginning to dawn on him. When his glance rested more critically on Philip, the boy's age, the poverty of his circumstances, the whole fantastic incongruity of the affair, forced his recognition. Not unprepared for such a retort, Philip gathered the stones together, and twisted the ends of the paper. Evidently the parcel was going back into his pocket. He glanced at a clock, too, which ticked solemnly over the office door. "Here, what are you doing?" cried Isaacstein. "Going to some one who will deal with me in a reasonable manner. It is not very late yet. I suppose there are plenty of firms like yours in Hatton Garden, or I can go back to Mr. Wilson----" "Sit down. Sit down," growled the Jew, vainly striving to cloak his nervousness by a show of grim jocosity. "I never saw such a boy in my life. You are touchy as gunpowder. I was only joking." "I am not joking, Mr. Isaacstein. Your price is my price--fifty thousand pounds." "Do you think I carry that amount of money in my purse?" demanded Isaacstein, striving desperately to think out some means whereby he could get Philip into more amiable mood, when, perchance, the true story of the gems might be revealed. "No," was the answer. "Even if you gave it to me I should not take it away. I want you to advance, say fifty pounds, to-day. I require clothes--and other things. Then, to-morrow, you can bring me to a bank, and pay a portion of the purchase price to my credit, giving me at the same time a written promise to pay the remainder within a week, or a month--any reasonable period, in fact." The diamond merchant was quickly becoming serious, methodical, as he listened. This business-like proposal was the one thing needed to restore his bewildered faculties. "Tell me, boy," he said, "who has been advising you?" "No one." "Do you mean to say you came here to-day to trade with me without consulting any other person?" "I certainly told Mr. Abingdon I was coming, and I feel that I can always return to him for any advice if I am in a difficulty, but the offer I have just made is my own."