Before, however, I tell you what discoveries I have made in London, and
how I came to be mixed up in this matter of the Diamond, I want to know
one thing. You look, my old friend, as if you didn't quite understand
the object to be answered by this consultation of ours. Do your looks
belie you?"

"No, sir," I said. "My looks, on this occasion at any rate, tell the
truth."

"In that case," says Mr. Franklin, "suppose I put you up to my point
of view, before we go any further. I see three very serious questions
involved in the Colonel's birthday-gift to my cousin Rachel. Follow me
carefully, Betteredge; and count me off on your fingers, if it will
help you," says Mr. Franklin, with a certain pleasure in showing how
clear-headed he could be, which reminded me wonderfully of old times
when he was a boy. "Question the first: Was the Colonel's Diamond the
object of a conspiracy in India? Question the second: Has the conspiracy
followed the Colonel's Diamond to England? Question the third: Did the
Colonel know the conspiracy followed the Diamond; and has he purposely
left a legacy of trouble and danger to his sister, through the innocent
medium of his sister's child? THAT is what I am driving at, Betteredge.
Don't let me frighten you."

It was all very well to say that, but he HAD frightened me.

If he was right, here was our quiet English house suddenly invaded by
a devilish Indian Diamond--bringing after it a conspiracy of living
rogues, set loose on us by the vengeance of a dead man. There was our
situation as revealed to me in Mr. Franklin's last words! Who ever heard
the like of it--in the nineteenth century, mind; in an age of progress,