r every chance, and a thousand started up like steel
spikes to snatch the bolt. For a moment I was stunned, but, never being
very subject to despair, on my recovery, which was almost at once, took
every measure that could be devised. Who had touched me? Whom had I met?
Through what streets had I come? In ten minutes the Prefect had the
matter in hand. My injunctions were strict privacy. I sincerely hoped
the mishap would not reach England; and if the diamond were not
recovered before the Marquis of G. arrived,--why, there was the Seine.
It is all very well to talk,--yet suicide is so French an affair, that
an Englishman does not take to it naturally, and, except in November,
the Seine is too cold and damp for comfort, but during that month I
suppose it does not greatly differ in these respects from our own
atmosphere.

A preternatural activity now possessed me. I slept none, ate little,
worked immoderately. I spared no efforts, for everything was at stake.
In the midst of all G. arrived. Hay also exerted himself to the utmost;
I promised him a hundred pounds, if I found it. He never told me that
he said how it would be, never intruded the state of the market, never
resented my irritating conduct, but watched me with narrow yet kind
solicitude, and frequently offered valuable suggestions, which, however,
as everything else did, led to nothing. I did not call on G., but in
a week or so his card was brought up one morning to me. "Deny me," I
groaned. It yet wanted a week of the day on which I had promised to
deliver him the diamond. Meanwhile the Baron Stahl had reached Paris,
but he still remained in private,--few had seen him.

The police were forever on the wrong track. To-day they stopped the old
Comptesse du Quesne and her jewels, at the Barriere; to-morrow, with
their long needles, they riddled a package of lace destined for the
Duchess of X. herself; the Secret Service was doubled; and to crown
all, a splendid new star of the testy Prince de Ligne was examined and
proclaimed to be paste,--the Prince swearing vengeance, if he could
discover the cause,--while half Paris must have been under arrest. My
own hotel was ransacked thoroughly,--Hay begging that his traps might be
included,--but nothing resulted, and I expected nothing, for, of course,
I could swear that the stone was in my pocket when I stepped into the
street. I confess I never was nearer madness,--every word and gesture
stung me like asps,--I walked on bu