ering all he had, and would most
surely have squandered the jewel too, could he have laid his hands on it.
And yet 'tis said he did not, therefore I think he must have stowed it
safe in some place where afterwards he could not get at it. For if't had
been near Moonfleet, he would have had it up a hundred times. But thou
hast often talked of Blackbeard and his end with Parson Glennie; so speak
up, lad, and let us hear all that thou know'st of these tales. Maybe
'twill help us to come to some judgement.'

So I told him all that Mr. Glennie had told me, how that Colonel John
Mohune, whom men called Blackbeard, was a wastrel from his youth, and
squandered all his substance in riotous living. Thus being at his last
turn, he changed from royalist to rebel, and was set to guard the king in
the castle of Carisbrooke. But there he stooped to a bribe, and took from
his royal prisoner a splendid diamond of the crown to let him go; then,
with the jewel in his pocket, turned traitor again, and showed a file of
soldiers into the room where the king was stuck between the window bars,
escaping. But no one trusted Blackbeard after that, and so he lost his
post, and came back in his age, a broken man, to Moonfleet. There he
rusted out his life, but when he neared his end was filled with fear, and
sent for a clergyman to give him consolation. And 'twas at the parson's
instance that he made a will, and bequeathed the diamond, which was the
only thing he had left, to the Mohune almshouses at Moonfleet. These were
the very houses that he had robbed and let go to ruin, and they never
benefited by his testament, for when it was opened there was the bequest
plain enough, but not a word to say where was the jewel. Some said that
it was all a mockery, and that Blackbeard never had the jewel; others
that the jewel was in his hand when he died, but carried off by some that
stood by. But most thought, and handed down the tale, that being taken
suddenly, he died before he could reveal the safe place of the jewel; and
that in his last throes he struggled hard to speak as if he had some
secret to unburden.

All this I told Elzevir, and he listened close as though some of it was
new to him. When I was speaking of Blackbeard being at Carisbrooke, he
made a little quick move as though to speak, but did not, waiting till I
had finished the tale. Then he broke out with: 'John, the diamond is yet
at Carisbrooke. I wonder I had not thought of Carisbrooke befo