the great prize would be his. Slowly and cautiously he threaded the tortuous pathway that led to the heart of the hill. He reached the end of it in safety, and the cavern loomed dim and vast before him. He paused for a moment, and held the lamp high above his head. There, fixed in the middle of the sandy floor he could just make out the vague outlines of the Indian idol. The great gem that flashed in its forehead caught a ray from the feeble lamp held by Ducie, and flung it back intensified a thousandfold. Dude saw the flash; and his breath came thick and fast. He advanced one step--a second. Then, before he knew what had happened, he found himself stretched on the floor of the cave and in utter darkness. He had stumbled over some inequality in the floor, and had dropped his lamp in falling. Bruised and bleeding, and with a curse on his lips, he rose to his feet. The predicament in which he now found himself was anything but a pleasant one. That he could find the idol even in the dark, and make himself master of the Diamond, he did not doubt. But the question was, whether if he wandered so far away from the narrow passage by which access was had to the cavern, he could find it again, and so get back to the library before the clock struck twelve. If that could be done all might yet be well. If it could not be done--but he would not stop to argue the point. He would make a bold dash for the Diamond. He would risk everything in one final throw, and trust that the good fortune which had so far befriended his enterprise would not desert him in this great crisis of his fate. A few seconds sufficed for him to weave these thoughts in his brain, and almost before he had decided on what he would do he was advancing deeper into the cavern; advancing slowly, step by step, with outstretched arms, in the direction of the idol. By the light of his lamp he had noted its position, and now that he was in the dark he went to it nearly in a straight line. Suddenly it seemed as though the idol had risen noiselessly from the ground. The palm of his left hand smote its flat cold forehead. He lost not an instant in feeling for the Diamond. The moment his fingers touched it he thrilled from head to foot. The Diamond was held in its place in the forehead of the idol by a small gold clasp which worked in the hollow of the skull. It occupied Ducie some three or four minutes, first to find the clasp, and afterwards to unfasten it. At length he succeeded in opening it, and the Diamond dropped into his palm. His own at last!