Jewel Mysteries by Max Pemberton

The accursed gems lie sedately in the lowest drawer of my strong room, shining from a couple of dozen of prim leather cases, with a light which is full of strange memories. I call them accursed because I cannot sell them; yet there are those with other histories, stones about which the fancy of romance has sported, and the strong hand of tragedy has touched with an indelible brand. It may be that the impulse of sentiment, working deep down in the heart of the ostensibly commercial character, forbids me to cry some of these wares in the market-place with any vigor; it may be that the play of chance moves the mind of the jewel-buyer to a prejudice against them. In any case, they lie in my safe unhonored and unsung -- and, lacking that which Sewell called the "precious balsam" of reputation, are merely so much carbon or mineral matter giving light to iron walls which give no light again.

For the stones which have no history I am not an apologist. Some day, those excellent people who now decry them in every salon where jewels are discussed, will give up the hope of attempting to buy them cheaply; and I shall make my profit. Everything comes to him who _can_ wait, and I am not in a hurry. As to the others, which have been the pivots of romance or serious story, they may well lie as they are while they serve my memory in the jotting down of some of these mysteries.