I fairly gasped as I dropped them.

“We are the richest men in the whole world,” I said.  “Monte Christo was a fool to us.”

“We shall flood the market with diamonds,” said Good.

“Got to get them there first,” suggested Sir Henry.

We stood still with pale faces and stared at each other, the lantern in the middle and the glimmering gems below, as though we were conspirators about to commit a crime, instead of being, as we thought, the most fortunate men on earth.

“Hee! hee! hee!” cackled old Gagool behind us, as she flitted about like a vampire bat.  “There are the bright stones ye love, white men, as many as ye will; take them, run them through your fingers, eat of them, hee! hee! drink of them, ha! ha!”

At that moment there was something so ridiculous to my mind at the idea of eating and drinking diamonds, that I began to laugh outrageously, an example which the others followed, without knowing why.  There we stood and shrieked with laughter over the gems that were ours, which had been found for us thousands of years ago by the patient delvers in the great hole yonder, and stored for us by Solomon’s long-dead overseer, whose name, perchance, was written in the characters stamped on the faded wax that yet adhered to the lids of the chest.  Solomon never got them, nor David, or Da Silvestra, nor anybody else. We had got them:  there before us were millions of pounds’ worth of diamonds, and thousands of pounds’ worth of gold and ivory only waiting to be taken away.

Suddenly the fit passed off, and we stopped laughing.

“Open the other chests, white men,” croaked Gagool, “there are surely more therein.  Take your fill, white lords! Ha! ha! take your fill.”

Thus adjured, we set to work to pull up the stone lids on the other two, first—­not without a feeling of sacrilege—­breaking the seals that fastened them.

Hoorah! they were full too, full to the brim; at least, the second one was; no wretched burglarious Da Silvestra had been filling goat-skins out of that.  As for the third chest, it was only about a fourth full, but the stones were all picked ones; none less than twenty carats, and some of them as large as pigeon-eggs.  A good many of these bigger ones, however, we could see by holding them up to the light, were a little yellow, “off coloured,” as they call it at Kimberley.

What we did not see, however, was the look of fearful malevolence that old Gagool favoured us with as she crept, crept like a snake, out of the treasure chamber and down the passage towards the door of solid rock.

*****

Hark!  Cry upon cry comes ringing up the vaulted path.  It is Foulata’s voice!

“Oh, Bougwan! help! help! the stone falls!”

“Leave go, girl!  Then—­”

“Help! help! she has stabbed me!”