"The Waldorf has nothing on that," Pete Murphy said when they stopped,
gorged.

"Say, remember to look for smokes, all of you," Ralph Addington
admonished them suddenly.

"You betchu!" groaned Honey Smith, and his look became lugubrious. But
his instinct to turn to the humorous side of things immediately crumpled
his brown face into its attractive smile. "Say, aren't we going to be
the immaculate little lads? I can't think of a single bad habit we can
acquire in this place. No smokes, no drinks, few if any eats - and not a
chorister in sight. Let's organize the Robinson Crusoe Purity League,
Parlor Number One."

"Oh, gee!" Pete Murphy burst out. "It's just struck me. The Wilmington
'Blue,' is lost forever - it must have gone down with everything else."

Nobody spoke. It was an interesting indication of how their sense of
values had already shifted that the loss to the world of one of its
biggest diamonds seemed the least of their minor disasters.

"Perhaps that's what hoodooed us," Pete went on. "You know they say the
Wilmington 'Blue' brought bad luck to everybody who owned it. Anyway,
battle, murder, adultery, rape, rapine, and sudden death have followed
it right along the line down through history. Oh, it's been a busy cake
of ice - take it from muh! Hope the mermaids fight shy of it."

"The Wilmington 'Blue' isn't alone in that," Ralph Addington said. "All
big diamonds have raised hell. You ought to hear some of the stories
they tell in India about the rajahs' treasures. Some of those briolettes