"Isn't it your business, sir," I asked, "to know what to do next? Surely

it can't be mine?"

Mr. Franklin didn't appear to see the force of my question--not being in

a position, at the time, to see anything but the sky over his head.

"I don't want to alarm my aunt without reason," he said. "And I don't

want to leave her without what may be a needful warning. If you were in

my place, Betteredge, tell me, in one word, what would you do?"

In one word, I told him: "Wait."

"With all my heart," says Mr. Franklin. "How long?"

I proceeded to explain myself.

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"As I understand it, sir," I said, "somebody is bound to put this plaguy

Diamond into Miss Rachel's hands on her birthday--and you may as well

do it as another. Very good. This is the twenty-fifth of May, and the

birthday is on the twenty-first of June. We have got close on four weeks

before us. Let's wait and see what happens in that time; and let's warn

my lady, or not, as the circumstances direct us."

"Perfect, Betteredge, as far as it goes!" says Mr. Franklin. "But

between this and the birthday, what's to be done with the Diamond?"

"What your father did with it, to be sure, sir!" I answered. "Your

father put it in the safe keeping of a bank in London. You put in the

safe keeping of the bank at Frizinghall." (Frizinghall was our nearest

town, and the Bank of England wasn't safer than the bank there.) "If

I were you, sir," I added, "I would ride straight away with it to

Frizinghall before the ladies come back."

The prospect of doing something--and, what is more, of doing that

something on a horse--brought Mr. Franklin up like lightning from the

flat of his back. He sprang to his feet, and pulled me up, without

ceremony, on to mine. "Betteredge, you are worth your weight in

gold," he said. "Come along, and saddle the best horse in the stables

directly."

Here (God bless it!) was the original English foundation of him showing

through all the foreign varnish at last! Here was the Master Franklin

I remembered, coming out again in the good old way at the prospect of a

ride, and reminding me of the good old times! Saddle a horse for him?

I would have saddled a dozen horses, if he could only have ridden them

all!

We went back to the house in a hurry; we had the fleetest horse in the

stables saddled in a hurry; and Mr. Franklin rattled off in a hurry, to

lodge the cursed Diamond once more in the strong-room of a bank. When

I heard the last of his horse's hoofs on the drive, and when I turned

about in the yard and found I was alone again, I felt half inclined to

ask myself if I hadn't woke up from a dream.




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