Mr. Solomon Madgin was a little dried-up man, about sixty years old.  His tail-coat and vest of rusty black were of the fashion of twenty years ago.  He wore drab trousers, and shoes tied with bows of black ribbon.  His head, bald on the crown, had an ample fringe of white hair at the back and sides, and was covered, when he went abroad, with a beaver hat, very fluffy and much too tall for him, and which, once upon a time, had probably been nearly as white as his hair, but was now time-worn and weather-stained to one uniform and consistent drab.  Round his neck he always wore a voluminous cravat of unstarched muslin fastened in front with an old-fashioned pearl brooch, above which protruded the two spiked points of a very stiff and pugnacious-looking collar.  A strong alpaca umbrella, unfashionably corpulent, was his constant companion.  Mr. Madgin’s whiskers were shaved off in an exact line with the end of his nose.  His eyebrows were very white and bushy, and could serve on occasion as a screen to the greenish, crafty-looking eyes below them, which never liked to be peered into too closely.  The ordinary expression of his thin, dried-up face was one of hard, worldly shrewdness; but there was a lurking bonhommie in his smile which seemed to imply that, away from business, he might possibly mellow into a boon companion.

Mr. Madgin had to wait a few minutes this morning before Lady Chillington could receive him.  When he was ushered into her sitting-room he was surprised to find that she and Miss Hope were not alone; that a plainly-dressed man, who looked almost as old as Mr. Madgin himself, was seated at the table.  After one suspicious glance at the stranger, Mr. Madgin made his bow to the ladies and walked up to the table with his bag of papers.

“You can put all those things away for the day, Mr. Madgin,” said her ladyship.  “A far more important matter claims our attention just now.  In the first place I must introduce to you Sergeant Nicholas, many years ago servant to my son, Captain Chillington, who died in India.  (Sergeant, this is Mr. Madgin, my man of business.) The Sergeant, who has only just returned to England, told me yesterday a very curious story which I am desirous that he should repeat in your presence to-day.  The story relates to a diamond of great value, said to have been stolen from the body of my son immediately after death, and I shall require you to give me your opinion as to the feasibility of its recovery.  You will take such notes of the narrative as you may think necessary, and the Sergeant will afterwards answer, to the best of his ability, any questions you may choose to put to him.”  Then turning to the old soldier, she added:  “You will be good enough, Sergeant, to repeat to Mr. Madgin such parts of your narrative of yesterday as have any reference to the diamond.  Begin with my son’s dying message.  Repeat, word for word, as closely as you can remember, all that was told you by the sycee Rung.  Describe as minutely as possible the personal appearance of M. Platzoff; and detail any other points that bear on the loss of the diamond.”