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"I tell you I made it," he said. "Give it back to me."
He replaced it hastily and buttoned his jacket. "I will sell
it you for one hundred pounds," he suddenly whispered eagerly.
With that my suspicions returned. The thing might, after all, be
merely a lump of that almost equally hard substance, corundum, with
an accidental resemblance in shape to the diamond. Or if it was a
diamond, how came he by it, and why should he offer it at a hundred
pounds?
We looked into one another's eyes. He seemed eager, but
honestly eager. At that moment I believed it was a diamond he was
trying to sell. Yet I am a poor man, a hundred pounds would leave
a visible gap in my fortunes and no sane man would buy a diamond by
gaslight from a ragged tramp on his personal warranty only. Still,
a diamond that size conjured up a vision of many thousands of
pounds. Then, thought I, such a stone could scarcely exist without
being mentioned in every book on gems, and again I called to mind
the stories of contraband and light-fingered Kaffirs at the Cape.
I put the question of purchase on one side.
"
How did you get it?" said I.
I made it."
"
I had heard something of Moissan, but I knew his artificial
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