Page:Love Insurance - Earl Biggers (1914).djvu/154



R. MINOT opened his eyes on Thursday morning with the uncomfortable feeling that he was far from his beloved New York. For a moment he lay dazed, wandering in that dim borderland between sleep and waking. Then, suddenly, he remembered.

"Oh, yes, by jove," he muttered, "I've been knighted. Groom of the Back-Stairs Scandals and Keeper of the Royal Jewels—that's me."

He lifted his pillow. There on the white sheet sparkled the necklace of which the whole British nobility was proud—Chain Lightning's Collar. Some seventy-five blue-white diamonds, pear-shaped, perfectly graduated. His for the moment!

"What's Harrowby up to, I wonder?" he