lyn, flushing and speaking hastily.
"Like a child who, longing for a toy, Singh was always bothering my
father to let him have it to wear. You see, sir, Indian princes dress
up so very much, to look big before their people, and they have such
numbers of jewels and ornaments that one more or less does not seem of
much consequence. Singh has got hundreds of things belonging to him
that he will have some day to do what he pleases with, and my father, I
suppose, thought that it didn't much matter about letting him have one."

"No doubt, Mr Severn, the Colonel had perfectly correct views upon the
subject, living as he has done nearly all his life at an Indian court,
and I am only looking at the matter with the eyes of an ordinary
Englishman who never wears so much as a ring. Oh, here he comes. Let
me see. I have a large magnifying-glass here in my table-drawer that
may be useful to help to decipher the intaglio writing. Ah, we ought to
have had here that poor friend of Mr Morris's who applied to me for an
engagement; but I hear that he has left the town."

The Doctor was searching in his drawer so that he did not see the change
in Glyn's countenance; and as he looked up it was not at his pupil, but
at the door, which was suddenly thrown open, and Singh rushed in,
looking wild and staring, as he literally shouted: "It's gone! It's
gone!"

CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE.

SINGH'S ANNOUNCEMENT.

"Gone!" said the Doctor, letting the reading-glass fall upon his
blotting-pad. "What has gone?"

"My father's belt!" cried the boy passionately. "It has been stolen.
It is not in the box."

"Stop, stop, stop!" said the Doctor firmly. "You are speaking
excitedly. My dear boy, be calm."

"But it's gone, sir!" cried Singh, with his eyes flashing now, as he
looked from one to the other. "I tell you it's been stolen.--Oh, Glyn,
what will your father say? What shall I do?"

"Be calm," repeated the Doctor slowly. "My dear boy, recollect that I
stand to you, as we say in Latin, _in loco parentis_; and in the place
of your guardian I must tell you that in your excitement you are making
a very rash and cruel charge."

"But, sir--" began Singh, with an imperious stamp of the foot.

"Stop!" cried the Doctor. "At my time of life I have learned a good
deal of the weakness of human nature, and how prone we are to judge
wrongfully, especially in a case like this. On several occasions I have
known people to be suspected and charge