The original news item concerning the diamond of the goddess Kali was handed in to the city editor. He smiled and held it for a moment above the wastebasket. Then he laid it back on his desk and said: "Try the Sunday people; they might work something out of it."  
The Sunday editor glanced the item over and said: "H'm!" he sent for a reporter and expanded his comment.
 
"You might see General Ludlow," he said, "and make a story out of this if you can. Diamond stories are a drug; but this one is big enough to be found by a scrubwoman wrapped up in a piece of newspaper and tucked under the corner of the hall . Find out first if the General has a daughter who intends to go on the stage. If not, you can go ahead with the story. Run cuts of the Kohinoor and J. P. Morgan's collection, and work in pictures of the Kimberley mines and Barney Barnato. Fill in with a comparison of the values of diamonds, radium, and cutlets since the meat strike; and let it run to a half page."
 
On the following day the reporter turned in his story. The Sunday editor let his eye along its lines. "H'm!" he said again. This time the copy went into the waste-basket with scarcely a flutter.
 
The reporter a little around the lips; but he was whistling softly and between his teeth when I went over to talk with him about it an hour later.
 
"I don't blame the 'old man'," said he, magnanimously, "for cutting it out. It did sound like funny business; but it happened exactly as I wrote it. Say, why don't you fish that story out of the w.-b. and use it? Seems to me it's as good as the tommyrot you write."
 
I accepted the tip, and if you read further you will learn the facts about the diamond of the goddess Kali as for by one of the most reliable reporters on the staff.
 
Gen. Marcellus B. Ludlow lives in one of those decaying but old red-brick in the West Twenties. The General is a member of an old New York family that does not advertise. He is a globe-trotter by birth, a gentleman by , a millionaire by the mercy of Heaven, and a of precious stones by occupation.
 
The reporter was admitted when he made himself known at the General's residence at about eight thirty on the evening that he received the assignment. In the magnificent library he was greeted by the traveller and connoisseur, a tall, gentleman in the early fifties, with a nearly white moustache, and a bearing so soldierly that one perceived in him scarcely a trace of the National Guardsman. His weather-beaten lit up with a charming smile of interest when the reporter made known his errand.
 
"Ah, you have heard of my latest find. I shall be glad to show you what I conceive to be one of the six most valuable blue diamonds in existence."
 
The General opened a small safe in a corner of the library and brought a plush-covered box. Opening this, he exposed to the reporter's bewildered gaze a huge and brilliant diamond—nearly as large as a hailstone.
 
"This stone," said the General, "is something more than a jewel. It once formed the central eye of the three-eyed goddess Kali, who is worshipped by one of the fiercest and most fanatical tribes of India. If you will arrange yourself comfortably I will give you a brief history of it for your paper."
 
General Ludlow brought a decanter of whiskey and glasses from a cabinet, and set a comfortable armchair for the lucky scribe.
 
"The Phansigars, or Thugs, of India," began the General, "are the most dangerous and of the tribes of North India. They are extremists in religion, and worship the goddess Kali in the form of images. Their are interesting and . The robbing and murdering of travellers are taught as a and deed by their strange religious code. Their worship of the three-eyed goddess Kali is conducted so secretly that no traveller has ever heretofore had the honour of witnessing the ceremonies. That distinction was reserved for myself.
 
"While at Sakaranpur, between Delhi and Khelat, I used to explore the jungle in every direction in the hope of learning something new about these mysterious Phansigars.
 
"One evening at I was making my way through a teakwood forest, when I came upon a deep circular depression in an open space, in the centre of which was a rude stone temple. I was sure that this was one of the temples of the Thugs, so I myself in the undergrowth to watch.
 
"When the moon rose the depression in the clearing was suddenly filled with hundreds of shadowy, swiftly forms. Then a door opened in the temple, exposing a brightly image of the goddess Kali, before which a white-robed priest began a barbarous incantation, while the tribe of worshippers themselves upon the earth.
 
"But what interested me most was the central eye of the huge wooden . I could see by its flashing brilliancy that it was an immense diamond of the purest water.
 
"After the rites were concluded the Thugs slipped away into the forest as silently as they had come. The priest stood for a few minutes in the door of the temple enjoying the cool of the night before closing his rather warm quarters. Suddenly a dark, shadow slipped down into the hollow, leaped upon the priest; and struck him down with a glittering knife. Then the murderer sprang at the image of the goddess like a cat and out the glowing central eye of Kali with his weapon. Straight toward me he ran with his royal prize. When he was within two paces I rose to my feet and struck him with all my force between the eyes. He rolled over senseless and the magnificent jewel fell from his hand. That is the splendid blue diamond you have just seen—a stone worthy of a monarch's crown."
 
"That's a story," said the reporter. "That decanter is exactly like the one that John W. Gates always sets out during an interview."
 
"Pardon me," said General Ludlow, "for forgetting hospitality in the excitement of my . Help yourself."
 
"Here's looking at you," said the reporter.
 
"What I am afraid of now," said the General, lowering his voice, "is that I may be robbed of the diamond. The............