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256. Possibly, my dear lord, a deeper humour than even you are aware of."

"How about my lady's diamonds?" asked Captain Macpherson, strolling out into the verandah.

"Oh, Captain Macpherson," cried Lady Waveryng, "do relieve me from the responsibility of these wretched things! How Briggs could have misunderstood me, and how she could have supposed that I should want my jewels in the Bush, I can't imagine. I never wore them except during that week with the Prince. She and Lord Waveryng's man had distinct orders that they were to be placed in the Bank."

"I am afraid, my dear, that your orders weren't very clear," said Lord Waveryng, rather grimly. "I never knew Prentiss misunderstand any order of mine."

"Where are the diamonds now?" asked Captain Macpherson.

"In the medicine chest, lying in the trays where lint and diachylon plaster and surgical appliances belong," said Lord Horace. "Fortunately, it's a large medicine chest. That is the only receptacle in the house that has a safe key, and they put a Bramah lock on it, on account of the poisons."

"Horace wanted us to put them in the sugar bin," said Lady Waveryng.

"No, Em. The flour bin, I said, it's deeper. And sugar is sticky, especially ration sugar, and the after associations might have been unpleasant. However, Waveryng preferred the medicine chest, which during the day is watched in turn by Miss Briggs and Mr. Prentiss, my lady's woman and my lord's man."

"And indeed," said Elsie, "it only needs candles and a pall to make one think that they are watching a corpse."

"Mr. Prentiss occasionally flourishes a pocket revolver," observed Lord Horace, "and Miss Briggs has, I believe, armed herself with a cutting-up knife from the meat-store."

"I am sure that it would be a brave robber who tackled Briggs," said Lady Waveryng.

"At night," continued Lord Horace, "Waveryng sleeps