"Of course you will, dear," Mrs. Hockin replied, with provoking acquiescence. "The Major never fails, Erema, in any thing he is so sure about; and this is a mere child's toy to him. Well, dear, have you done it? But I need not ask. Oh, let us see what is inside of it!"

"I have not done it yet, Mrs. Hockin; and if you talk with such rapidity, of course you throw me out. How can I command my thoughts, or even recall my experience?"

"Hush! now hush, Erema! And I myself will hush most reverently."

"You have no reverence in you, and no patience. Do you expect me to do such a job in one second? Do you take me for a common jeweler? I beg you to remember--"

"Well, my dear, I remember only what you told us. You were to turn it round twice, you know, and then cry Sesame. Erema, was it not so?"

"I never said any thing of the sort. What I said was simply this--However, to reason with ladies is rude; I shall just be off to my study."

"Where you keep your tools, my darling," Mrs. Hockin said, softly, after him: "at least, I mean, when you know where they are."

I was astonished at Aunt Mary's power of being so highly provoking, and still more at her having the heart to employ it. But she knew best what her husband was; and to worship forever is not wise.

"Go and knock at his door in about five minutes," Mrs. Hockin said to me, with some mischief in her eyes. "If he continues to fail, he may possibly take a shorter way with it. And with his tools so close at hand--"

"Oh," I exclaimed, "his geological hammer--that dreadful crusher! May I go at once? I detest that thing, but I can not have it smashed."

"He will not break it up, my dear, without your leave. He never would think of such a thing, of course. However, you may as well go after him."

It was wrong of Mrs. Hockin to make me do this; and I felt quite ashamed of myself when I saw the kind old Major sitting by his lamp, and wrinkling his forehead into locks and keys of puzzle, but using violence to his own mind alone. And I was the more ashamed when, instead of resenting my intrusion, he came to meet me, and led me to his chair, and placed the jeweled trinket in my hand, and said, "My dear, I give it up. I was wrong in taking it away from you. You must consult some one wiser."

"That odious thing!" I answered, being touched by this unusual humility of his; "you shall not give it up; and I know no wiser person. A lapidary's tricks are below your knowledge. But if you are not tired of me and offended, may I leave it to you to get it opened?"

"I would like nothing better," he replied, recovering his natural briskness and importance; "but you ought to be there, my dear; you must be there. Are you sure that you ought not rather to take it to your good cousin Lord Castlewood? Now think before you answer."

"I need not think twice of that, Major Hockin. Good and learned as my father's cousin is, he has distinctly refused to help me, for some mysterious reason of his own, in searching into this question. Indeed, my great hope is to do it without him: for all that I know, he might even wish to thwart me."

"Enough, my dear; it shall be just as you wish. I brought you to England, and I will stand by you. My cousin, Colonel Gundry, has committed you to me. I have no patience with malefactors. I never took this matter up, for very many reasons; and among them not the least was that Sampson, your beloved 'Uncle Sam,' thought it better not to do so.

But if you desire it, and now that I feel certain that an infamous wrong has been done to you--which I heartily beg your pardon for my doubt of--by the Lord of all justice, every thing else may go to the devil, till I see it out. Do you desire it, Erema?"

"I certainly do not wish that any of your great works should be neglected. But if, without that, you can give me your strong help, my only difficulty will be to thank you."

"I like plain speaking, and you always speak plainly; sometimes too plainly," he said, recollecting little times when he had the worst of it. "How far do you trust me now?"

"Major Hockin, I trust you altogether. You may make mistakes, as all men do--"

"Yes, yes, yes. About my own affairs; but I never do that for other people. I pay a bill for twopence, if it is my own. If I am trustee of it, I pay three half-pence."

His meaning was a little beyond me now; but it seemed better not to tell him so; for he loved to explain his own figures of speech, even when he had no time to spare for it. And he clearly expected me to ask him to begin; or at least it seemed so from his eyebrows. But that only came home to me afterward.

"Please not to speak of my affairs like that," I said, as if I were quite stupid; "I mean to pay fourpence for every twopence--both to friends and enemies."

"You are a queer girl; I have always said so. You turn things to your own ideas so. However, we must put up with that, though none of my daughters have ever done it; for which I am truly thankful. But now there is very little time to lose. The meaning of this thing must be cleared up at once. And there is another thing to be done as well, quite as important, in my opinion. I will go to London with you to-morrow, if you like. My clever little Cornishman will see to things here--the man that sets up all the angles."

"But why should I hurry you to London so?" I asked. "Surely any good country jeweler could manage it? Or let us break it open."

"On no account," he answered; "we might spoil it all; besides the great risk to the diamonds, which are very brittle things. To London we must take it, for this reason--the closure of this case is no jeweler's work; of that I have quite convinced myself. It is the work of a first-rate lapidary, and the same sort of man must undo it."

To this I agreed quite readily, because of such things I knew nothing; whereas my host spoke just as if he had been brought up to both those walks of art. And then I put a question which had long been burning on my tongue.

"What made you imagine, Major Hockin, that this very beautiful face could have ever been that of the old lady living in the ruin?"

"In Desolate Hole? I will tell you at once; and then call it, if you like, an imagination. Of all the features of the human face there is none more distinctive than the eyebrow. 'Distinctive' is not exactly what I mean--I mean more permanently marked and clear. The eyes change, the nose changes, so does the mouth, and even the shape of the forehead sometimes; but the eyebrows change very little, except in color. This I have noticed, because my own may perhaps be a little peculiar; and they have always been so. At school I received a nickname about it, for boys are much sharper than men about such things; and that name after fifty years fits as well as ever. You may smile, if you like; I shall not tell you what it was, but leave you to re-invent it, if you can. Now look at this first-rate miniature. Do you see an unusual but not uncomely formation of the eyebrows?"

"Certainly I do; though I did not observe it until you drew my attention. I had only regarded the face, as a whole."

"The face, as a whole, is undoubtedly fine. But the eyebrows have a peculiar arch, and the least little turn at the lower end, as if they designed to rise again. The lady of Desolate Hole has the same."

"But how can you tell? How very strange! I thought she let n.o.body see her face."

"You are perfectly right about that, Erema; so far at least as she has vouchsafed to exhibit her countenance to me. Other people may be more fortunate. But when I met her for the second time, being curious already about her, I ventured to offer my services, with my inborn chivalry, at a place where the tide was running up, and threatened to surround her.

My politeness was not appreciated, as too often is the case; for she made me a very stiff bow, and turned away. Her face had been covered by the m.u.f.fler of her cloak, as if the sea-breeze were too much for her; and she did not even raise her eyes. But before she turned away, I obtained a good glance at her eyebrows--and they were formed like these."

"But her age, Major Hockin! Her age--what is it?"

"Upon that proverbially delicate point I can tell you but little, Erema. Perhaps, however, I may safely say that she can not be much under twenty."

"It is not right to provoke me so. You call her 'the old woman,'

and compare her to your letter-box. You must have some idea--is she seventy?"

"Certainly not, I should say; though she can not expect me to defend her, when she will not show her face to me; and what is far worse, at my time of life, she won't even pay me a half-penny of rent. Now let us go back to Aunt Mary, my dear; she always insists upon packing overnight."

CHAPTER XLVII

CADMEIAN VICTORY

Before two o'clock of the following day Major Hockin and myself were in London, and ready to stay there for two or three days, if it should prove needful. Before leaving Bruntsea I had written briefly to Lord Castlewood, telling him that important matters had taken me away from Shoxford, and as soon as I could explain them, I would come and tell him all about it. This was done only through fear of his being annoyed at my independence.

From London Bridge the Major took a cab direct to Clerkenwell; and again I observed that of all his joys one of the keenest was to match his wits against a cabman's. "A regular m.u.f.f, this time," he said, as he jerked up and down with his usual delight in displaying great knowledge of London; "no sport to be had out of him. Why, he stared at me when I said 'Rosamond Street,' and made me stick on 'Clerkenwell.' Now here he is taking us down Snow Hill, when he should have been crossing Smithfield.

Smithfield, cabby, Smithfield!"

"Certain, Sir, Smiffle, if you gives the order;" and he turned the poor horse again, and took us up the hill, and among a great number of barriers. "No thoroughfare," "No thoroughfare," on all hands stretched across us; but the cabman threaded his way between, till he came to the brink of a precipice. The horse seemed quite ready, like a Roman, to leap down it, seeing nothing less desirable than his present mode of life, till a man with a pickaxe stopped him.

"What are you at?" cried the Major, with fury equalled by nothing except his fright. "Erema, untie my big rattan. Quick--quick--"

"Captain," said the cabman, coolly, "I must have another shilling for this job. A hextra mile and a quarter, to your orders. You knows Lunnon so much better. Smiffle stopped--new railway--new meat market--never heered of that now, did you?"

"You scoundrel, drive straight to the nearest police office."

"Must jump this little ditch, then, Captain. Five pun' fine for you, when we gets there. Hold on inside, old gentleman. Kuck, kuck, Bob, you was a hunter once. It ain't more than fifty feet deep, my boy."

"Turn round! turn round, I tell you! turn round! If your neck is forfeit, you rogue, mine is not. I never was so taken in in my life!"

Major Hockin continued to rave, and amid many jeers we retreated humbly, and the driver looked in at us with a gentle grin. "And I thought he was so soft, you know! Erema, may I swear at him?"