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 IAMONDS!

I stared, fascinated, at the glassy heap on the bunk. I picked up one which, but for the weight, might have been a fragment of broken bottle.

"Are you sure, Suzanne?"

"Oh, yes, my dear. I've seen rough diamonds too often to have any doubts. They're beauties too, Anne—and some of them are unique, I should say. There's a history behind these."

"The history we heard to-night," I cried.

"You mean?"

"Colonel Race's story. It can't be a coincidence. He told it for a purpose."

"To see its effect, you mean?"

I nodded.

"Its effect on Sir Eustace?"

"Yes."

But, even as I said it, a doubt assailed me. Was it Sir Eustace who had been subjected to a test, or had the story been told for my benefit? I remembered the impression I had received on that former night of having been deliberately "pumped." For some reason or other, Colonel Race was suspicious. But where did he come in? What possible connection could he have with the affair?

"Who is Colonel Race?" I asked.

"That's rather a question," said Suzanne. "He's pretty well known as a big-game hunter, and, as you heard him say to-night, he was a distant cousin of Sir Laurence