She took it, a small object wrapped in paper, strangely heavy for its size. "What is it?" she said again.
"Open it!" he said.
She complied, trembling a little. "Oh—Burke!" she said.
It lay in her hand, a rough stone like a small crystal, oddly shaped. The last of the evening light caught it, and it gleamed as if with living fire.
"The diamond!" she whispered.
"Yes—the diamond." Burke spoke very quietly. "He gave it to me just before he died. 'Tell her she is not to keep it!' he said. 'She is to sell it. I won it for her, and she is to make use of it.'"
"But—it is yours really," Sylvia said.
"No. It is yours." Burke spoke with insistence. "But I think he is right. You had better sell it. Vreiboom and some of Hoffstein's gang are after it. They don't know yet who won it. Donovan covered Guy's tracks pretty cleverly. But they'll find out. It isn't a thing to keep."
She turned to him impulsively. "You take it, partner!" she said.
"It was won with your money, and no one has a greater right to it."
"It is yours," he insisted.