Half-an-hour's talk now
will save hours of explanation later on. So listen to me, all of you--I
already see two gentlemen here, Mr. Killick, and Mr. Guyler, who in a
certain fashion, can corroborate some particulars that I shall give you.
Keep us free from interruption, if you please, while I tell you my story."
Ayscough answered this request by going to the door and leaning against
it, and Levendale took a chair by the side of the desk and looked round at
an expectant audience.
"It's a queer and, in some respects, an involved story," he said, "but I
shall contrive to make matters plain to you before I've finished. I shall
have to go back a good many years--to a time when, as Mr. Killick there
knows, I was a partner with Daniel Molteno in a jewellery business in the
City. I left him, and went out to South Africa, where I engaged in diamond
trading. I did unusually well in my various enterprises, and some years
later I came back to London a very well-to-do man. Not long after my
return, I met my former partner again. He had changed his name to
Multenius, and was trading in Praed Street as a jeweller and pawnbroker.
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