He seldom cared to look much at the jewel, and one night when I was praising it to him, spoke out: 'Set not thy heart too much upon this stone.

It is thine, and thine to deal with.

Never a penny will I touch that we may get for it.

Yet, were I thou, and reached great wealth with it, and so came back one day to Moonfleet, I would not spend it all on my own ends, but put aside a part to build the poor-houses again, as men say Blackbeard meant to do with it' I did not know what made him speak like this, and was not willing, even in fancy, to agree to what he counselled; for with that gem before me, lustrous, and all the brighter for lying on a rough deal table, I could only think of the wealth it was to bring to us, and how I would most certainly go back one day to Moonfleet and marry Grace.

So I never answered Elzevir, but took the diamond and slipped it back in the silver locket, which still hung round my neck, for that was the safest place for it that we could think of.
We spent some days in wandering round the town making inquiries, and learnt that most of the diamond-buyers lived near one another in a certain little street, whose name I have forgotten, but that the richest and best known of them was one Krispijn Aldobrand.