"Impossible!" said Elizabeth, and tears rose in her eyes, making them look softer and more wistful than ever.
"We could not do it," said the jeweller. "It is out of the question under the circumstances."
"Do you think," faltered the poor little saint, "do you think that nobody will buy them?"
"I am afraid not," was the reply. "No respectable firm who would pay their real value. If you take my advice, young lady, you will take them home and consult your friends."
He spoke kindly, but Elizabeth was overwhelmed with disappointment. She did not know enough of the world to understand that a richly dressed little girl who offered valuable jewels for sale at night must be a strange and unusual sight.
When she found herself on the street again, her long lashes were heavy with tears.
"If no one will buy them," she said, "what shall I do?"
She walked a long way—so long that she was very tired—and offered them at several places, but as she chanced to enter only respectable shops, the same thing happened each time. She was looked at curiously and questioned, but no one would buy.
"They are mine," she would say. "It is right that I should sell them."
But everyone stared and seemed puzzled, and in the end refused.
At last, after much wandering, she found herself in a poorer quarter of the city; the streets were narrower and dirtier, and the people began to look squalid and wretchedly dressed; there were smaller shops and dingy houses. She saw unkempt men and women and uncared for little children. The poverty of the poor she had seen in her own village seemed comfort and luxury by contrast. She had never dreamed of anything like this. Now and then she felt faint with pain and horror. But she went on.