It was said he had got possession of his Indian jewel by means which,

bold as he was, he didn't dare acknowledge. He never attempted to sell

it--not being in need of money, and not (to give him his due again)

making money an object. He never gave it away; he never even showed it

to any living soul. Some said he was afraid of its getting him into a

difficulty with the military authorities; others (very ignorant indeed

of the real nature of the man) said he was afraid, if he showed it, of

its costing him his life.

There was perhaps a grain of truth mixed up with this last report. It

was false to say that he was afraid; but it was a fact that his life

had been twice threatened in India; and it was firmly believed that the

Moonstone was at the bottom of it. When he came back to England, and

found himself avoided by everybody, the Moonstone was thought to be at

the bottom of it again. The mystery of the Colonel's life got in the

Colonel's way, and outlawed him, as you may say, among his own people.

The men wouldn't let him into their clubs; the women--more than

one--whom he wanted to marry, refused him; friends and relations got too

near-sighted to see him in the street.

Some men in this mess would have tried to set themselves right with

the world. But to give in, even when he was wrong, and had all society

against him, was not the way of the Honourable John. He had kept the

Diamond, in flat defiance of assassination, in India. He kept the

Diamond, in flat defiance of public opinion, in England. There you have

the portrait of the man before you, as in a picture: a character that

braved everything; and a face, handsome as it was, that looked possessed

by the devil.

We heard different rumours about him from time to time. Sometimes

they said he was given up to smoking opium and collecting old books;

sometimes he was reported to be trying strange things in chemistry;

sometimes he was seen carousing and amusing himself among the lowest

people in the lowest slums of London. Anyhow, a solitary, vicious,

underground life was the life the Colonel led. Once, and once only,

after his return to England, I myself saw him, face to face.

About two years before the time of which I am now writing, and about

a year and a half before the time of his death, the Colonel came

unexpectedly to my lady's house in London. It was the night of Miss

Rachel's birthday, the twenty-first of June; and there was a party in

honour of it, as usual. I received a message from the footman to say

that a gentleman wanted to see me. Going up into the hall, there I found

the Colonel, wasted, and worn, and old, and shabby, and as wild and as

wicked as ever.




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