The next thing I have to do, is to present such additional information

as I possess on the subject of the Moonstone, or, to speak more

correctly, on the subject of the Indian plot to steal the Diamond. The

little that I have to tell is (as I think I have already said) of some

importance, nevertheless, in respect of its bearing very remarkably on

events which are still to come.

About a week or ten days after Miss Verinder had left us, one of my

clerks entered the private room at my office, with a card in his hand,

and informed me that a gentleman was below, who wanted to speak to me.

I looked at the card. There was a foreign name written on it, which has

escaped my memory. It was followed by a line written in English at the

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bottom of the card, which I remember perfectly well: "Recommended by Mr. Septimus Luker."

The audacity of a person in Mr. Luker's position presuming to recommend

anybody to me, took me so completely by surprise, that I sat silent

for the moment, wondering whether my own eyes had not deceived me. The

clerk, observing my bewilderment, favoured me with the result of his own

observation of the stranger who was waiting downstairs.

"He is rather a remarkable-looking man, sir. So dark in the complexion

that we all set him down in the office for an Indian, or something of

that sort."

Associating the clerk's idea with the line inscribed on the card in my

hand, I thought it possible that the Moonstone might be at the bottom of

Mr. Luker's recommendation, and of the stranger's visit at my office. To

the astonishment of my clerk, I at once decided on granting an interview

to the gentleman below.

In justification of the highly unprofessional sacrifice to mere

curiosity which I thus made, permit me to remind anybody who may read

these lines, that no living person (in England, at any rate) can claim

to have had such an intimate connexion with the romance of the Indian

Diamond as mine has been. I was trusted with the secret of Colonel

Herncastle's plan for escaping assassination. I received the Colonel's

letters, periodically reporting himself a living man. I drew his Will,

leaving the Moonstone to Miss Verinder. I persuaded his executor to act,

on the chance that the jewel might prove to be a valuable acquisition to

the family. And, lastly, I combated Mr. Franklin Blake's scruples,

and induced him to be the means of transporting the Diamond to Lady

Verinder's house. If anyone can claim a prescriptive right of interest

in the Moonstone, and in everything connected with it, I think it is

hardly to be denied that I am the man.

The moment my mysterious client was shown in, I felt an inner conviction

that I was in the presence of one of the three Indians--probably of the

chief. He was carefully dressed in European costume. But his swarthy

complexion, his long lithe figure, and his grave and graceful politeness

of manner were enough to betray his Oriental origin to any intelligent

eyes that looked at him.




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