It was a delightfully cool evening, after a hot dusty day on the Diamond
Fields, and Mr Moses Moss, attorney-at-law of Kimberley, South Africa,
was sitting under the verandah of his house, smoking a cigar, and
sipping a cool drink as it was his custom to do before turning in for
the night. As he smoked his thoughts turned to his prospects and his
position, and on the whole they were of a somewhat cheerful and
self-satisfied character. It was only a few years since he had hurried
away from England a broken man. He had found the temptations to
overstep the boundary which separates sharp from malpractice too much
for him, and his conduct had attracted the meddlesome attentions of the
Incorporated Law Society, who had made itself very disagreeable indeed
to him. The time he had spent on the Diamond Fields, however, had done
wonders. He was worth a nice little sum of money; and as an attorney
and money-lender he had got together a very lucrative connection.
On the Diamond Fields he had remembered his English experiences. They
had taught him the good old maxim, that honesty was the best policy, and
this had been the golden rule of his life, which he had always acted
upon so far as compatible with the practice of an attorney whose clients
happen, as a matter of fact, to be men of somewhat shady characters.
However, he kept always on the windy side of the law, although the
temptations to go just a little crooked were very strong. There were at
that time many diamonds to be bought, for very reasonable prices, by
persons who were content to buy under circumstances which the law
punished with great severity. Mr Moss had come to the conclusion,
however, that dealing in stolen diamonds was too risky a business to
follow. He used to make it his boast that he hardly knew a rough
diamond when he saw one, and he said that he never wished to have any
dealings in them. Indirectly, of course, he--like every one else on the
Diamond Fields--lived by diamonds. His clients as a rule were in what
was called the illicit. But he could not help that, he said. Of course
he was happy enough to defend any one who had got into trouble for
buying stolen diamonds. Then if any one came to him to borrow money it
was not his business to ask questions as to what the money was wanted
for. The money was generally wanted at once, and gold rather than notes
or cheques was in request. But those circumstances did not suggest
anything to Mr Moss, or if they did, he kept his thoughts to himself.
He was too busy in considering the large percentage he could charge and
the security he could get to bother himself about matters that did not
concern him. He did not wish to be told anything about what his clients
thought of doing with the money they came to him hurriedly to borrow.
When on one occasion a man who wanted a hundred pounds in gold at once
was indiscreet enough to blurt out something about having a chance to
get hold of a `big un' for that sum which was worth ten times the money,
Mr Moss was very much hurt at being asked to share any such guilty
knowledge. He certainly did not go so far as to refuse to entertain the
loan, but he took care to ease his conscience by charging an extra
twenty per cent.
Some people said that Mr Moss in a way avenged the claimholders who
suffered from the depredations of the illicit diamond-buyers, and that
he preyed upon them as they preyed on the mining interest, and there is
no doubt a good share of the price of many a stolen diamond got into his
clutches. It was characteristic of the sources from which he acquired
his money, that the very house in which he lived should have once
belonged to one Ike Hart, who in his day had been a very notorious buyer
of stolen diamonds, and had flourished wonderfully until he bought one
diamond too many, which happened to have been sent him by the police.
He had had the advantage of Mr Moss's professional assistance at his
trial and advice about his private affairs. Mr Hart had been
convicted, and had been sent to do a sentence of hard labour on the
Capetown Breakwater, and Mr Moss had become possessed of his house.
Ike Hart was said to have sworn that he would be even with Moss, and to
have declared that he had been robbed. However, Mr Moss felt
satisfied, as he reviewed his career, that he had never done anything
that the law could take hold of. If in one or two cases he had grabbed
somewhat greedily at his clients' property, those clients were out of
the way of harming him, and there was not the slightest chance of his
being made to disgorge any of the plunder he had got together.
Mr Moss's house stood back from the road in a good-sized garden--if you
could call a place a garden in which nothing grew but a few cacti and a
mass of straggling tobacco-trees--which was separated from the road by a
high, corrugated-iron fence.
As Mr Moss smoked in his verandah, he began to think that amongst the
bushes at the end of the garden he could distinguish a form of a man
stooping over the ground. At first he felt nervous; then he became
curious, as he made the figure out more clearly. It certainly was the
figure of a man, and he seemed to be digging for something. "What was
he after? What could he hope to find?" Mr Moss asked himself.
He would find out that for himself, he determined. So he got up, and
slinking along very quietly in the shade of the fence, he crept up close
to the man who, for reasons best known to himself, had visited his
compound at night. The man went on working without noticing him. He
was digging into the ground with a broken bit of spade, and seemed to be
very intent upon what he was about.
Close to where the man was digging there was a water-barrel, and Mr
Moss got behind it, and watched his visitor with considerable interest.
When Mr Moss called to mind who the former owner of the premises was,
he began to have a suspicion of what his visitor was looking for. He
remembered that there had been some talk of Ike Hart's having several
big diamonds hidden away when he was arrested. The man dug for some
time, then scratched about with his hands in the hole, then measured
from the wall with a tape-measure, and then set to work again. All of a
sudden he threw down the spade and picked something up.
Mr Moss's heart gave a jump when he saw this. The man had picked up a
bundle of rag in which something seemed to be wrapped. The stranger
unfolded it, and as he did so Mr Moss sprang from behind the
water-barrel, and placed his hand on his shoulder.
"Who are you? and what's that you have found in my garden? Come, drop
it, or I will call the police," Mr Moss said, for the other was an
undersized, slight man, and he did not feel very much afraid of him.
"Leave me alone! keep your hands off, or I will make a hole in yer!" the
man answered. As he spoke the attorney saw that he had something in his
hand which glistened rather nastily in the moonlight.
"Put up that knife, or I will shout out; there is a policeman at the
corner of the road, most likely, and they can hear me at the house
across the road," he said.
"Leave me alone, then, and I will clear out. I don't want to have
nothing to do with you," the man said; and he gave a wriggle away.
"Give me what you have just taken from my garden, then," said Mr Moss;
"it belongs to me--I saw you pick up the--"
"Hush! you fool!" the man said, interrupting him. "Maybe there is a
peeler outside in the road, and they would hear that word if they were
within half a mile of us."
"Look here, my man, you don't think I'm going to let you take away what
you have just found--you haven't got a prospecting licence to look for
diamonds in my garden, so just give it up, and I will say nothing about
what I caught you at."
"You bet you won't, but it happens the diamond is mine. The party who
planted it there left it me; that party was poor Ike Hart, who died the
other day in Capetown jail, that's where I've just come from. When poor
old Ike saw he weren't going to live to get out, he manages to tell me
about this. He was a pal of mine, was Ike, and he thought he'd do me a
good turn. I've tramped up here from Capetown to get this big 'un."
"See here, my man," said Mr Moss, "I don't want to be hard on you. You
say you have a right to the diamond because Ike Hart gave it you--I say
it's mine because it's in my garden. Suppose we compromise the matter;
come into my house, and we will talk it quietly over."
"I don't mind going into your house, gov'ner, but keep your hands off
me, or you'll have more than you like," the little man said, emphasising
his remarks with a gesture with the knife, which made the attorney feel
uncomfortable.
"Now, gov'ner, what's yer game? If you won't speak first, I will.
Come, you've got into this by seeing what you have seen, and I don't
mind speaking out fair. What do you say to halves?" the man said, after
he had sat down in a chair in Mr Moss's sitting-room. "There's enough
for us both, seems to me. Ike Hart told me he could easily have got
eight thou, for it, and he intended to have taken it home if he hadn't
been run in."
"Eight thousand! You're talking nonsense. Hart was not such a fool as
to think that; but let's have a look at it," Mr Moss said, as he got a
glance at the stone which the other held in his hand.
"No, you don't, gov'ner," the man said, as Mr Moss stretched out his
hand for the diamond.
The attorney thought for a minute or two. For a second the idea flashed
across his mind that it might be a police trap. He had never bought a
diamond illegally before, and the laws against having rough diamonds in
your possession unless you could account for them, and were either a
licensed dealer or buyer, were very strict. If he kept the diamond in
his possession, instead of giving it up to the Crown, he would be
committing a criminal offence, for which he would be liable to a severe
punishment. He did not believe that the police would try to trap him.
Besides, he was impressed with his visitor's manner, and thought that he
seemed to be anxious to keep the diamond. Moss looked at the diamond,
and thought that it was the biggest stone he had ever seen, and he began
to long to get it into his possession. He did not, as he said, know
much about diamonds, but no one could have lived a few months on the
Diamond Fields without knowing that such a stone as the one he saw was
worth a great deal of money. Ike Hart was probably right; it was likely
enough that he could have got eight thousand for it, and that it was
really worth much more. As Mr Moss looked at it, a reckless greed came
over him, and he determined that he would have it.
"Well, I suppose we needn't quarrel; your offer is a fair one, we will
go halves; and as you know me and I don't know you, I will have the
diamond and will give you your share when I sell it; I dare say I can
dispose of it more advantageously than you can," he said, smiling
blandly at his visitor.
"Dare say you can, gov'ner; but I sticks to it till I get the pieces for
it," was the answer. And nothing that the attorney could urge would
shake his determination.
Mr Moss generally had in a safe in his house a large sum of money in
notes and gold. The people who came to borrow from him often preferred
money to cheques on bankers, and they would often pay well for change.
At that time it happened that he had a thousand sovereigns tied up in
canvas bags in his safe, which he had procured for a customer whom he
had reason to believe would come to him the next day. So after he had
in vain tried to persuade the other to trust him with the diamond, he
determined that he would then and there buy him out; and he hoped that
the sight of the gold would be more than the other could stand, and that
he would be induced to sell very cheap.
Mr Moss opened the safe, eyeing his visitor somewhat mistrustfully as
he did so.
"Well, it happens I can buy the stone from you at once. I happen to
have a hundred pounds--it's a good bit of money to pay for one's own
property, for that diamond is my property; but there, it's your luck.
Now hand it over, and let's have a look," Moss said, as he held out his
hand for the stone.
The little man put the stone down on a piece of white paper on the
table. "Hands off, gov'ner," he said, emphasising his words with a
motion with the knife; "put down the pieces alongside, and we will say
if it's a deal."
Moss got out a bag containing a hundred sovereigns, and opening it he
put it down on the table.
"It ain't a deal, gov'ner, it wants a lot more than that lot to buy my
diamond. Bless yer, Ike Hart told me what it was worth. It's worth
twenty times that to me, and a lot more to a gent like you," the little
man said, but Moss noticed that his eyes glistened at the sight of the
gold, and he looked at it hungrily. However, when Moss declared he had
no more money, the man put the diamond back in his pocket and made as if
he intended to go away. Moss determined that he would get hold of the
diamond. What did a hundred pounds more or less matter? that stone was
worth a fortune. He determined he would not miss it. If he could only
summon up courage to snatch up a revolver that was on the top of his
safe, he might get hold of the diamond without paying for it.
The little man's eyes followed his. "Look 'ere, gov'ner, don't yer try
that game on. If yer was to reach, I shall have to stick this into yer,
and may be we would be both sorry when it was too late," he said.
Moss knew that he daren't carry out the little idea that had come into
his mind. If he got the diamond he would have to pay for it, so he took
down another bag; then he shut up the safe to show that no more money
was forthcoming. But it was no good.
"Four thousand sovereigns Ike said any of the big illicit buyers would
give me for it," the little man said.
Moss began to think that they probably would, and he began to feel
afraid that the prize was going to slip away from him. Then he took
down another bag, and after that another, and another, until he had
offered all the money he had. Then at last the man seemed to be unable
to stand the sight of so much money.
"Well, it's cruel to let a stone like this go for that lot; but there,
if you've no more pieces, and 'olds to your claim to the diamond,
anythink for a quiet life. It's a bargain--lend me something to put the
stuff in." There was a black travelling-bag in the room, and into this
the contents of the canvas bags were poured. The cheerful clinking of
the sovereigns was anything but grateful music to Mr Moss; it seemed
like giving away the money, for if he had only chanced to find the
diamond first it would have been his for nothing. His visitor, however,
listened as if the sound was a pleasing novelty to him. For all that,
as he slouched out with the bag in his hand, he grumbled out something
about having thrown away a fortune, and it was enough to make Ike Hart
turn in his grave for him to have let the stone go so cheap.
When he was left alone Mr Moss thought that under the circumstances he
might indulge in the luxury of another cigar, and another glass of
Hollands. As he smoked he thought of the wonderful diamond he had
bought, and what he could do with it. It was a wonderful stone indeed,
he had never seen a bigger, and the colour seemed good enough. A
thousand pounds was a good lot of money to venture in a business a man
knew so little about as Mess did about diamonds; still he felt very
confident that there was a good deal more to be made out of it. The
worst of it was that the law would prove a terrible stumbling-block to
him. He began to feel quite nervous when he thought that if the police
only knew of his having the diamond in his possession, they could seize
it, and haul him off to the jail. For the first time he had gone wrong
about a diamond, and laid himself open to the very stringent penalties
which are imposed upon the unlawful possession of diamonds. He knew
that by the ordinance he would be bound to give up to the police the
diamond that had been found in his garden. However, he thought he knew
a trick worth two of that. After he had smoked for some time a plan
came into his head, which, as he thought over it, seemed to be
excellent. He invented a history for the diamond that had come into his
possession, which would enable him to deal with it boldly and openly.
It should make him famous as the man who found the great Moss Diamond.
The newspapers should all write about him, and he would show his
wonderful gem at Windsor Castle.
Then the money that he would sell it for--that was the pleasantest
thought of all, and Mr Moss wove all sorts of blissful visions of the
future as he looked into the smoke of his cigar.
Jobling's Sell is a not over prosperous digging on the banks of the Vaal
River. Who Jobling was, and what his Sell might have been, are now
rather matters of legend than history, so long ago do the days seem when
the place was first rushed, though, as a matter of fact, it is
considerably less than twenty years ago. The story goes that Jobling
was a wily speculator in strong drinks, and other necessaries, who,
having laid in a stock of brandy and groceries, repaired to the spot
afterwards named after him, and managed to promote a rush to it by
spreading false news of many diamonds having been found there. It is
said that Jobling got into rather hot water for this, and was sentenced
by a jury of diggers to be dragged through the river as a punishment for
having created a bogus rush. But just at the critical moment when the
sentence was going to be executed some one found a diamond. Then
several other good diamonds were found, and it turned out that Jobling,
whatever his intentions might have been, really had been a great
benefactor. It is certainly a matter of history that Jobling's Sell was
a wonderfully paying place in its palmy day, before it was more or less
worked out. Old Hawkins, who had wandered all over the world as a
gold-digger, but had for some reason or other taken root at Jobling's,
was the only digger who remained on there from the old days.
The rest of its population were men who went there for a spell, after
having tried other digging on the river, and soon gave it up. Hawkins
liked to talk of the big diamonds he had seen found there. Or he would
walk along the banks and point out where the big hotel used to be, and
where the gambling saloons stood in the days when Jobling's Sell boasted
of all the properties of a prosperous mining camp. Those days were
over, and the thirty or so diggers who formed the camp only made enough
to live on. One Saturday afternoon a knot of them were collected at the
solitary canteen which supplied the wants of Jobling's Sell. They were
not drinking more than was good for them, for money was scarce, and the
host, though he swaggered to strangers much about the future in store
for `Jobling's,' did not back up his faith by showing any willingness to
score up drinks to its present population.
"Say, boys, have you heard about old Mick Hawkins's luck?" said a big
man with a black beard, Jack Austin by name, who was lounging at the
bar.
"No,--what? Has he found anything big?" asked another man.
"Well, he has found a man who is flat enough to give him a ten-pound
note for his claim. It is a Kimberley Jew who has made that
investment," answered Austin.
"Never met with that sort of Jew, and I have seen a good bit of them in
one country or another," said another man, who was believed to have had
a very varied experience of life, before he found himself digging on the
banks of the Vaal River.
"Well, it's a solid fact; Hawkins showed me the ten-pound note, and he
would be here now spending it, only the new proprietor of that claim of
his has promised him five pounds a week to work for him."
"Things are looking up at last, boys," said the proprietor of the
canteen. "I told you they would soon recognise the splendid openings
for investment there are down the river. What will you take, boys?
Have a drink with me just for luck."
No one refused the offer, though the enthusiasm the landlord expressed
was not shared by the others.
After they had emptied their glasses, some one suggested that they
should go round to Hawkins's claim, and with that intention they lounged
out of the canteen, and strolled along the bank in that direction.
"Stop, boys, and watch 'em; why it makes quite a picture. Did you ever
see such a fool?" said Austin, holding up his hand and pointing to an
opening in the thorn trees and underwood, through which they could get a
view of the Hawkins's claim.
The claim was one which had been almost worked out in the days when the
place was first rushed. Hawkins, a grizzled old fellow, was seated with
a pipe in his mouth, watching two Kaffirs picking away at the side of
the claim, filling buckets with the gravel, which another Kaffir was
carrying across to the sorting-table, at which the new proprietor of the
claim was seated. That person was no other than our old friend, Mr
Moses Moss. He was got up as a digger, wearing a red flannel shirt, and
a very broad-brimmed hat, and he had put on, though there was no
particular use for them, a pair of long boots.
"Looks as though he was going to find a diamond every minute; he will
tire a bit of the game before long," Jack Austin said, as he watched the
new arrival on the river. "The doctor ordered him an open-air life, so
he gave up his practice. He was a lawyer in Kimberley, and down he
comes here to dig. Did any one ever hear of such a thing?"
"Hullo, by God, what's his game now? What's he up to? Blessed if I
don't believe he has found!" another digger said, as to their surprise
Moss suddenly threw his hat into the air with a tremendous shout of
triumph.
"Hullo, mate, what are you up to now? what do yer think you have got
hold of?" growled out old Hawkins, as he came up with his pipe in his
mouth.
"A diamond!--a wopping big diamond! Oh, hurrah! hurrah!" Mr Moss
cried, executing a dance of triumph.
The other men crowded round Moss, eager to see what he had found.
Hawkins looked rather mortified. It was somewhat annoying that a
diamond should have been found in his claim the day after he sold it.
His expression, however, changed a good deal when the other handed him
the diamond.
"Say, did you find this just now; it's a mighty rum thing to find in a
claim; why--" Hawkins was grumbling out, when Austin gave him a kick,
and motioned to him to keep quiet.
"Magnificent diamond, sir; the finest stone that ever has been found.
Did ever man see such luck? Here you come down just for a lark, and
find a fortune; but there, luck is one of the queerest things out!"
Jack Austin said.
"Well, I _am_ lucky, I don't mind owning it; but there, boys, come and
have a drink, every blessed one of you, to celebrate the biggest diamond
that ever has been found down the river, which you just saw me find,"
Mr Moss said, and the diggers seemed to fall in with his humour
willingly enough, following him without any more pressing to the
canteen.
Jack Austin might have been noticed to wink slightly at the proprietor
of the canteen, before the diamond was shown to the latter. His
enthusiasm when he saw it was unbounded.
"Knocks the Komnoor into a cocked hat. I always said we would show 'em
all the way, some day. What's it to be, sir, champagne--I've got a case
in stock?" he said, and in a few second she was opening a case, and
getting out some bottles.
The wine was some which the canteen-keeper had bought at a sale in
Kimberley. It was a remnant which had failed to please the not over
critical taste of the Fields. He had bought it very cheap, and had kept
it by him, knowing that on any extraordinary occasion, when a demand
arose for it on the river, its want of quality would not matter. As the
wine was being got out, Jack Austin touched the lucky digger on the
shoulder.
"Beg pardon, sir, but about old Hawkins; what are you going to do for
him? It's a bit hard on him, seeing a stone like this found after he
has just sold his claim."
"Hard! bless me no--a bargain is a bargain. I bought the claim for good
or bad."
"Well, that's true enough; but he might make himself a bit nasty about
it. You see it's rather a rum start your finding a stone like that in
the ground you were working, and Hawkins might get talking, and people
are apt to be a bit uncharitable."
Mr Moss looked a little uncomfortable. The man was right. Hawkins
ought to be put into a good temper, and after some little talk he took
out a cheque-book and wrote out a cheque for fifty pounds, for Austin
had suggested that it would be as well to give it to Hawkins at once,
before he began to talk.
Hawkins took the cheque, looking very stolid. Soon after he got it he
hurried away, and might have been seen tramping across the veldt towards
Kimberley, where he changed it.
When the glasses were filled, Jack Austin called to the company to drink
to the health of Mr Moss, the lucky digger, who had just found the big
diamond.
"He has just given our friend Hawkins another fifty, on account of the
claim in which it was found. So you see he is a generous man, besides
being an honest digger, and a jolly good chap," Jack said.
Mr Moss was much struck with the thirstiness of the river-diggers. The
news of the find had very quickly travelled down the banks of the Vaal,
and men from various other camps looked into the canteen. When they
finished the champagne they set to work at the brandy, and then at the
square gin, and the Cape smoke. Nothing seemed to come amiss to them.
There was one peculiarity in their manners, which somewhat amazed Mr
Moss. They had a curious way of bursting into laughter about nothing at
all, as far as he could see. They did not show any envy, but to a man
were full of a generous wish to drink with the fortunate finder. Their
estimate of the value of the diamond was somewhat vague. One said fifty
thou, another laughed at the idea of fifty thousand buying it, and
seemed to have quite a contempt for such a paltry sum of money; though
he would have had to have searched a long time in the pockets of his
trousers before he could find sixpence. "A hundred thou, more like,
that's what it's worth," he said, pretty confidently.
"Nice chap he is, to talk about a hundred thou. I think I have spent
about enough money on that lot," Moss thought to himself. He hated
spending money, but still he thought that the more delighted he appeared
to be about his find, the more genuine the find would seem to be. When
the stock-in-trade of the canteen was just giving out, a man from
Kimberley, whom Moss knew, came into the canteen. He was a
diamond-buyer, of the name of Jacobs, and Moss rejoiced to think that at
last he would be able to get a good opinion as to the value of his find.
"Well, Moss, what's this I hear about your having turned digger, and
found all at once? You have wonderful luck; show us the stone," the
new-comer said.
"Well, you can have a look at it, though I don't suppose it is much in
your way," Moss said, as he gave it him.
"My eye, it's a big 'un!" said the diamond-buyer, and then his
expression changed. "What on earth is your game?" he asked. "Who are
you trying to get at?"
"What's my game? why I want to know how much that is worth. You won't
buy it yourself, I know, because you're only a small man; but what do
you put its price down as?"
"Well, about half-a-crown, may be more, may be less; it's a pretty
clever sell too," was to the astonishment of Moss the answer he
received. "Why, Moss, you don't mean to say any one has been fooling
you with this."
"Fooling me! What do you mean? Don't play any tricks with me, for I
can't stand it. Do you mean to tell me that ain't a diamond?"
"Diamond, of course it ain't a diamond!--not a real one, that's to say,
it's a sham 'un. I have never seen one before, but I have heard of 'em
before. Joe Aavons, who you know of, got them made for him at home
somewhere, and he has sold one or two of 'em at night to illicit
diamond-buyers."
The man's face told Moss that he was in earnest, and a roar of laughter
from the diggers confirmed him.
"Well, mate, how about the big diamond; is it fifty or a hundred thou,
that it's worth?" Jack Austin said, and the others gave vent to the
suppressed merriment of the last few hours in a yell of laughter. It
was too bad, Moss thought, to treat him like that, after they had got
him to pay for their liquor. It was terrible for him to think of the
money he had lost, if his purchase turned out to be worthless.
"Yes, that is one of Joe Aavons' diamonds. I'll bet little Dick Starks
has been working 'em off for Joe, and they say they have made a lot of
money out of them."
"Look here, what is Dick Stark like?" Moss asked, rather eagerly.
"He is a little chap, with a cast in one eye, and red hair. He is a
pretty sharp customer, is Dick."
Moss recognised the description only too well as that of the man whom he
had seen find the diamond. Without saying another word he left the
canteen. The next day old Hawkins took possession again of his claim;
for Mr Moss was never seen more at Jobling's Sell.
The story, however, very soon followed him back to Kimberley, and the
circumstances under which he was persuaded to pay a thousand pounds for
the diamond became well-known; for Messrs. Aavons and Stark, who were
much elated at their success, told their particular friends, who
repeated the story. Mr Moss never quite got over it; and though he
never had any more transactions in diamonds he ceased to boast about his
honesty, or even make any allusion to his knowledge of precious stones.
Story 4.