Chapter 38

that than I was then; but I am sorry I never came again to see you. Perhaps we did not quite understand on either side.”

“We shall understand each other better now, I fancy,” said Mr. Burns. “I am glad you have not changed your opinion, for I have changed mine. If it weren’t for you, I should be retired by this time, and you would have found another name over the door. But we’ll have a talk about all that. Allow me to ask you whither you are bound.”

“I am on my way home,” answered Cosmo. “I have not seen my father for several--for more than two years.”

“You’ll do me the honour to put up at my house to-night, will you not? I am a bachelor, as you know, but will do my best to make you comfortable.”

Cosmo gladly assented; and as it was now evening, Mr. Burns hastened the shutting of his shop; and in a few minutes they were seated at supper.

As soon as the servant left them, they turned to talk of divine righteousness in business; and thence to speak of the jeweller’s; after which Cosmo introduced that of the ring. Giving a short narrative of the finding of it, and explaining the position of Lady Joan with regard to it, so that his host might have no fear of compromising himself, he ended with telling him he had brought it to him, and with what object.

“I am extremely obliged to you, Mr. Warlock,” responded the jeweller, “for placing such confidence in me, and that notwithstanding the mistaken principles I used to advocate. I have seen a little farther since then, I am happy to say; and this is how it was: the words you then spoke, and I took so ill, would keep coming into my mind, and that at the most inconvenient moments, until at last I resolved to look the thing in the face, and think it fairly out. The result is, that, although I daresay nobody has recognized any difference in my way of doing business, there is one who must know a great difference: I now think of my neighbour’s side of the bargain as well as of my own, and abstain from doing what it would vex me to find I had not been sharp enough to prevent him from doing with me. In consequence, I am not so rich this day as I might otherwise have been, but I enjoy life more, and hope the days of my ignorance God has winked at.”

Cosmo could not reply for pleasure. Mr. Burns saw his emotion, and understood it. From that hour they were friends who loved each other.

“And now for the ring!” said the jeweller.

Cosmo produced it.

Mr. Burns looked at it as if his keen eyes would pierce to the very heart of its mystery, turned it every way, examined it in every position relative to the light, removed it from its setting, went through the diamond catechism with it afresh, then weighed it, thought over it, and said,

“What do you take the stone to be worth, Mr. Warlock?”

“I can only guess, of course,” replied Cosmo; “but the impression on my mind is, that it is worth more nearly two hundred than a hundred and fifty pounds.”

“You are right,” answered Mr. Burns, “and you ought to have followed my trade; I could make a good jeweller of you. This ring is worth two hundred guineas, fair market-value. But as I can ask for no one more than it is absolutely worth, I must take my profit off you: do you think that is fair?”

“Perfectly,” answered Cosmo.

“Then I must give you only two hundred pounds for it, and take the shillings myself. You see it may be some time before I get my money again, so I think five per cent on the amount is not more than the fair thing.”

“It seems to me perfectly fair, and very moderate,” replied Cosmo.

As soon as dinner was over, he sat down to write to Joan. While there was nothing that must be said, he had feared writing. This was what he wrote:

“My dearest Joan,

“As you have trusted me hitherto, so trust me still, and wait for an explanation of my peculiar behaviour in going away without bidding you good-by, till the proper time comes--which must come one day, for our master said, more than once, that there was nothing covered which should not be revealed, neither hid that should not be known. I feel sure therefore, of being allowed to tell you everything sometime.

“I herewith send you a cheque as good as bank-notes, much safer to send, and hardly more difficult for Dr. Jermyn to turn into sovereigns.

“I borrowed of him fifteen pounds--a good deal more than I wanted. I have therefore got Mr. Burns, my friend, the jeweller, in this city, to add five pounds to the two hundred which he gives for the ring, and beg you, Joan, for the sake of old times, and new also, to pay for me the fifteen pounds to Dr. Jermyn, which I would much rather owe to you than to him. The rest of it, the other ten pounds, I will pay you when I can--it may not be in this world. And in the next--what then, Joan? Why then--but for that we will wait--who more earnestly than I?

“To all the coming eternity, dear Joan, I shall never cease to love you--first for yourself, then for your great lovely goodness to me. May the only perfection, whose only being is love, take you to his heart--as he is always trying to do with all of us! I mean to let him have me out and out.

“Dearest Joan, Your far-off cousin, but near friend,

“COSMO WARLOCK.”