Page:Rowland--The closing net.djvu/164

148 string of pearls was stolen two nights ago from the wife of my half-brother, Mrs. Cuttynge."

Rosenthal pushed himself back in his chair and stared at me. His eyes, which were of a light hazel colour, slightly bulging and curiously mottled with dark-brown spots, opened until they looked like the glass ones you see in opticians. His tufty, grizzled eyebrows went up, and his jaw dropped. Then he burst into his big, raucous laugh.

"What is this you are singing me?" he cried. "But no. You are mistaken, my fr'rent. Stolen pearls? That is goot. That cannot be. I bought t'em from a man I haf traded wit' for many years. He is a careful man. He knows der history of all he buys." "Nevertheless, these are Mrs. Cuttynge's pearls," I answered. "I am a bit of a connoisseur myself, and I sat for three hours behind these at the opera. There can be no doubt. They were stolen the night before last. The worst of it is, I am in some measure suspected of the theft."

Rosenthal stared for an instant, then burst out:

"Py Chingo, but ve vill soon know." He gathered up the pearls, wrapped them hastily in the cotton and paper, and shoved them into his pocket.

"Come, my fr'rendt," says he; "ve vill yoomp in a taxi and go right down. Py Chingo, vas eferybody stealing jewels? Come!"

So out we went. It didn't take us long to get down to the place where Rosenthal had bought the pearls. The house was a buyer and seller of precious stones, he told me, and had been established for over fifty years.