The Moonstone Read online

  II

  The Statement of THE CAPTAIN (1849)

  I am requested by Sergeant Cuff to set in writing certain facts,concerning three men (believed to be Hindoos) who were passengers, lastsummer, in the ship BEWLEY CASTLE, bound for Bombay direct, under mycommand.

  The Hindoos joined us at Plymouth. On the passage out I heard nocomplaint of their conduct. They were berthed in the forward part of thevessel. I had but few occasions myself of personally noticing them.

  In the latter part of the voyage, we had the misfortune to be becalmedfor three days and nights, off the coast of India. I have not got theship's journal to refer to, and I cannot now call to mind the latitudeand longitude. As to our position, therefore, I am only able to stategenerally that the currents drifted us in towards the land, and thatwhen the wind found us again, we reached our port in twenty-four hoursafterwards.

  The discipline of a ship (as all seafaring persons know) becomes relaxedin a long calm. The discipline of my ship became relaxed. Certaingentlemen among the passengers got some of the smaller boats lowered,and amused themselves by rowing about, and swimming, when the sun atevening time was cool enough to let them divert themselves in that way.The boats when done with ought to have been slung up again in theirplaces. Instead of this they were left moored to the ship's side.What with the heat, and what with the vexation of the weather, neitherofficers nor men seemed to be in heart for their duty while the calmlasted.

  On the third night, nothing unusual was heard or seen by the watch ondeck. When the morning came, the smallest of the boats was missing--andthe three Hindoos were next reported to be missing, too.

  If these men had stolen the boat shortly after dark (which I have nodoubt they did), we were near enough to the land to make it vain to sendin pursuit of them, when the discovery was made in the morning. I haveno doubt they got ashore, in that calm weather (making all due allowancefor fatigue and clumsy rowing), before day-break.

  On reaching our port I there learnt, for the first time, the reasonthese passengers had for seizing their opportunity of escaping from theship. I could only make the same statement to the authorities which Ihave made here. They considered me to blame for allowing the disciplineof the vessel to be relaxed. I have expressed my regret on this score tothem, and to my owners.

  Since that time, nothing has been heard to my knowledge of the threeHindoos. I have no more to add to what is here written.

  III

  The Statement of MR. MURTHWAITE (1850)

  (In a letter to MR. BRUFF)

  Have you any recollection, my dear sir, of a semi-savage person whom youmet out at dinner, in London, in the autumn of 'forty-eight? Permit meto remind you that the person's name was Murthwaite, and that you andhe had a long conversation together after dinner. The talk related toan Indian Diamond, called the Moonstone, and to a conspiracy then inexistence to get possession of the gem.

  Since that time, I have been wandering in Central Asia. Thence I havedrifted back to the scene of some of my past adventures in the northand north-west of India. About a fortnight since, I found myself ina certain district or province (but little known to Europeans) calledKattiawar.

  Here an adventure befell me, in which (incredible as it may appear) youare personally interested.

  In the wild regions of Kattiawar (and how wild they are, you willunderstand, when I tell you that even the husbandmen plough the land,armed to the teeth), the population is fanatically devoted to the oldHindoo religion--to the ancient worship of Bramah and Vishnu. The fewMahometan families, thinly scattered about the villages in the interior,are afraid to taste meat of any kind. A Mahometan even suspected ofkilling that sacred animal, the cow, is, as a matter of course, put todeath without mercy in these parts by the pious Hindoo neighbours whosurround him. To strengthen the religious enthusiasm of the people, twoof the most famous shrines of Hindoo pilgrimage are contained within theboundaries of Kattiawar. One of them is Dwarka, the birthplace of thegod Krishna. The other is the sacred city of Somnauth--sacked, anddestroyed as long since as the eleventh century, by the Mahometanconqueror, Mahmoud of Ghizni.

  Finding myself, for the second time, in these romantic regions, Iresolved not to leave Kattiawar, without looking once more on themagnificent desolation of Somnauth. At the place where I planned to dothis, I was (as nearly as I could calculate it) some three days distant,journeying on foot, from the sacred city.

  I had not been long on the road, before I noticed that other people--bytwos and threes--appeared to be travelling in the same direction asmyself.

  To such of these as spoke to me, I gave myself out as a Hindoo-Boodhist,from a distant province, bound on a pilgrimage. It is needless to saythat my dress was of the sort to carry out this description. Add, thatI know the language as well as I know my own, and that I am leanenough and brown enough to make it no easy matter to detect my Europeanorigin--and you will understand that I passed muster with the peoplereadily: not as one of themselves, but as a stranger from a distant partof their own country.

  On the second day, the number of Hindoos travelling in my directionhad increased to fifties and hundreds. On the third day, the throng hadswollen to thousands; all slowly converging to one point--the city ofSomnauth.

  A trifling service which I was able to render to one of myfellow-pilgrims, during the third day's journey, proved the means ofintroducing me to certain Hindoos of the higher caste. From these men Ilearnt that the multitude was on its way to a great religious ceremony,which was to take place on a hill at a little distance from Somnauth.The ceremony was in honour of the god of the Moon; and it was to be heldat night.

  The crowd detained us as we drew near to the place of celebration. Bythe time we reached the hill the moon was high in the heaven. My Hindoofriends possessed some special privileges which enabled them to gainaccess to the shrine. They kindly allowed me to accompany them. Whenwe arrived at the place, we found the shrine hidden from our view bya curtain hung between two magnificent trees. Beneath the trees a flatprojection of rock jutted out, and formed a species of natural platform.Below this, I stood, in company with my Hindoo friends.

  Looking back down the hill, the view presented the grandest spectacle ofNature and Man, in combination, that I have ever seen. The lower slopesof the eminence melted imperceptibly into a grassy plain, the place ofthe meeting of three rivers. On one side, the graceful winding of thewaters stretched away, now visible, now hidden by trees, as far as theeye could see. On the other, the waveless ocean slept in the calm ofthe night. People this lovely scene with tens of thousands of humancreatures, all dressed in white, stretching down the sides of the hill,overflowing into the plain, and fringing the nearer banks of the windingrivers. Light this halt of the pilgrims by the wild red flames ofcressets and torches, streaming up at intervals from every part ofthe innumerable throng. Imagine the moonlight of the East, pouring inunclouded glory over all--and you will form some idea of the view thatmet me when I looked forth from the summit of the hill.

  A strain of plaintive music, played on stringed instruments, and flutes,recalled my attention to the hidden shrine.

  I turned, and saw on the rocky platform the figures of three men. In thecentral figure of the three I recognised the man to whom I had spokenin England, when the Indians appeared on the terrace at Lady Verinder'shouse. The other two who had been his companions on that occasion wereno doubt his companions also on this.

  One of the spectators, near whom I was standing, saw me start. In awhisper, he explained to me the apparition of the three figures on theplatform of rock.

  They were Brahmins (he said) who had forfeited their caste in theservice of the god. The god had commanded that their purification shouldbe the purification by pilgrimage. On that night, the three men were topart. In three separate directions, they were to set forth as pilgrimsto the shrines of India. Never more were they to look on each other'sfaces. Never more were they to rest on their wanderings, from the daywhich witnessed their separation, to the day which witnessed t
heirdeath.

  As those words were whispered to me, the plaintive music ceased. Thethree men prostrated themselves on the rock, before the curtain whichhid the shrine. They rose--they looked on one another--they embraced.Then they descended separately among the people. The people made wayfor them in dead silence. In three different directions I saw the crowdpart, at one and the same moment. Slowly the grand white mass of thepeople closed together again. The track of the doomed men through theranks of their fellow mortals was obliterated. We saw them no more.

  A new strain of music, loud and jubilant, rose from the hidden shrine.The crowd around me shuddered, and pressed together.

  The curtain between the trees was drawn aside, and the shrine wasdisclosed to view.

  There, raised high on a throne--seated on his typical antelope, withhis four arms stretching towards the four corners of the earth--there,soared above us, dark and awful in the mystic light of heaven, the godof the Moon. And there, in the forehead of the deity, gleamed the yellowDiamond, whose splendour had last shone on me in England, from the bosomof a woman's dress!

  Yes! after the lapse of eight centuries, the Moonstone looks forth oncemore, over the walls of the sacred city in which its story first began.How it has found its way back to its wild native land--by what accident,or by what crime, the Indians regained possession of their sacred gem,may be in your knowledge, but is not in mine. You have lost sight of itin England, and (if I know anything of this people) you have lost sightof it for ever.

  So the years pass, and repeat each other; so the same events revolve inthe cycles of time. What will be the next adventures of the Moonstone?Who can tell?