Such a fatality naturally deserved no more than a brief paragraph in any daily paper. I should have heard nothing of it but for my friend Murray, of Scotland Yard, who telegraphed for me upon the afternoon of the following day; and, upon my arrival at his office, astonished me very much by first showing me an account of the circumstance in the _Eastern Daily Press_, and then passing for my examination a roll of cotton wool such as diamond brokers carry. “I want your opinion,” he said without preface. “Do you know anything of the jewels in that parcel?” There were four stones lying a-glitter upon the wool. One of them, a great gem of some hundred and twenty carats, rose-coloured, and altogether magnificent, I recognised at a single glance at the precious stones. “That,” I said, “is the Red Diamond of Ford Valley. Ask Baron Louis de Rothschild, and he will tell you whose property it was.” “Would you be very surprised to hear that it was found upon the body of the young sailor?” “Murray,” I said, “you have known me too long to expect me to be surprised by anything.” “But it is somewhat out of the way, isn’t it? That’s why I sent for you. The other stones don’t appear to be of the same class. But they’re valuable, I should think.” I turned them over in my hand and examined them with little interest. “This pure white is a Brazilian,” said I. “It may be worth a hundred and fifty pounds. The other two are jewellers’ common stuff. They would make a pretty pair of ear-rings for your daughter, Murray. You should make the Treasury an offer for them. Say fifty for the pair.” “The police haven’t much money to waste on the ladies’ ears,” he said rather hardly; “we prefer ’em without ornament—they go closer to the doors. I thought you would like to hear about this. We can’t make much of it here, and I don’t suppose you’ll make more. A ship’s officer like that—you don’t expect him to be a fence in a common way, and he’s about the last you’d name for a professional hand in Paris—for if this is Baron Louis’s stone, as you say, it must have been stolen in Paris.” “No reason at all, Murray. His wife wore it in her tiara. She was at the Prince’s, I believe, no more than a month ago. Does that occur to you?” He shrugged his shoulders as though I had been judging his capacity, which, God knows, would have been an unprofitable employment enough. “We haven’t begun to think about it,” he said. “How can we? No ship has reported his loss. He carried a pipe, a tobacco box, a gold watch, and this. Where does your clue start? Tell me that, and I’ll go on it.” “There are no papers, then?” “None—that is, this paper. And if you can make head or tail of it, I’ll give a hundred pounds to a hospital.” He passed across the table a worn and tattered letter case. It contained a dirty calendar of the year, a lock of dark-chestnut hair, a plain gold wedding ring, and a slip of paper with these words upon it: “Captain Three Fingers—Tuesday.”