BELL THREW RIKER’S NOTE ON THE DESK.

Archie picked it up and read it. “The ring for fair Marion?”

“It’ll keep.”

“Go.”

“I’m waiting to hear from Baltimore.”

Archie said, “Take an hour. Cool off. I’ll talk to Baltimore if they call before you’re back. Say, why don’t you take Marion with you? All this rain is making her stir-crazy. She’s raving about going to California to shoot movies in the sunshine. Neglecting to explain where she’d find the actors. Go! Let some steam off. You found Collins. You’ve got two hundred men looking for O’Shay. And the Navy and Harbor Squad hunting torpedoes. I’ll cover for you.”

Bell stood up. “Just an hour. Back soon.”

“If she likes it, steal an extra ten minutes to buy her a glass of champagne.”

THEY TOOK THE SUBWAY downtown and walked rain-swept streets to Maiden Lane. Barlowe’s shop cast a warm glow into the dreary afternoon. “Are you sure you want to do this?” Marion asked as they neared the door.

“What do you mean?”

“Once you slip a ring on a girl’s finger, it’s pretty hard to get out of it.”

They were holding hands. Bell pulled her close. Her eyes were bright with laughter. Rain and mist gilded the wisps of hair that escaped her hat. “Houdini couldn’t get out of this one,” he said, and kissed her on the mouth. “Not that he’d want to.”

They entered the shop.

Erhard Riker and Solomon Barlowe were bent over the counter, each with a jeweler’s loupe screwed in his eye. Riker looked up, smiling. He extended his hand to Bell, and said to Marion, “I am afraid that you taxed your fiancé’s powers of observation. Try as he might—and I assure you he tried mightily—he was hard put to convey the fullness of your beauty.”

Marion said, “You tax my power of speech. Thank you.”

Riker bowed over Marion’s hand, kissed it, and stepped back, smoothing his mustache and slipping his thumb into his vest pocket. Barlowe whispered to Bell, “It is most unusual, sir, for a gentleman to show the ring to his fiancée before he has purchased it.”

“Miss Morgan is a most unusual fiancée.”

Something ticked against the window. On the sidewalk, ignoring the rain, laughing young men in black derbies were batting a badminton shuttlecock with their hands.

“You should call a constable before they break the glass,” said Riker.

Solomon Barlowe shrugged. “College boys. This summer, they’ll meet girls. Next spring, they’ll be buying engagement rings.”

“Here is the making of yours, Miss Morgan,” said Riker. He drew a slim leather case from his pocket, opened it, and removed a folded sheet of white paper. Opening the paper, he let slide onto a demonstration panel of white velvet an emerald—flawless, fiery, and filled with life.

The jeweler Solomon Barlowe gasped.