It ran as follows:

 

“The great diamond which is the left eye of the god must return whence it came.”

 

The second letter was couched in precisely the same terms, but the third was

more explicit:

 

“You have been warned. You have not obeyed. Now the diamond will be taken from

you. At the full of the moon, the two diamonds which are the left and right eye

of the god shall return. So it is written.”

 

“The first letter I treated as a joke,” explained Miss Marvell. “When I got the

second, I began to wonder. The third one came yesterday, and it seemed to me

that, after all, the matter might be more serious than I had imagined.”

 

“I see they did not come by post, these letters.”

 

“No; they were left by hand—by a _Chinaman._ That is what frightens me.”

 

“Why?”

 

“Because it was from a Chink in San Francisco that Gregory bought the stone

three years ago.”