r's own lips have told them how long they will have to wait, and
your respectable authority has satisfied them that Mr. Luker has spoken
the truth. When do we suppose, at a rough guess, that the Diamond found
its way into the money-lender's hands?"

"Towards the end of last June," I answered, "as well as I can reckon
it."

"And we are now in the year 'forty-eight. Very good. If the unknown
person who has pledged the Moonstone can redeem it in a year, the
jewel will be in that person's possession again at the end of June,
'forty-nine. I shall be thousands of miles from England and English news
at that date. But it may be worth YOUR while to take a note of it, and
to arrange to be in London at the time."

"You think something serious will happen?" I said.

"I think I shall be safer," he answered, "among the fiercest fanatics of
Central Asia than I should be if I crossed the door of the bank with the
Moonstone in my pocket. The Indians have been defeated twice running,
Mr. Bruff. It's my firm belief that they won't be defeated a third
time."

Those were the last words he said on the subject. The coffee came in;
the guests rose, and dispersed themselves about the room; and we joined
the ladies of the dinner-party upstairs.

I made a note of the date, and it may not be amiss if I close my
narrative by repeating that note here:

JUNE, 'FORTY-NINE. EXPECT NEWS OF THE INDIANS, TOWARDS THE END OF THE
MONTH.

And that done, I hand the pen, which I have now no further claim to use,
to the writer who follows me next.

THIRD NARRATIVE

Contributed by FRANKLIN BLAKE

CHAPTER I

In the spring of the year eighteen hundred and forty-nine I was
wandering in the East, and had then recently altered the travelling
plans which I had laid out some months before, and which I had
communicated to my lawyer and my banker in London.

This change made it necessary for me to send one of my servants to
obtain my letters and remittances from the English consul in a certain
city, which was no longer included as one of my resting-places in my new
travelling scheme. The man was to join me again at an appointed place
and time. An accident, for which he was not responsible, delayed him on
his errand. For a week I and my people waited, encamped on the
borders of a desert. At the end of that time the missing man made his
appearance, with the money and the letters, at the entrance of my tent.

"I am afraid I bring you bad news,