"What a loathsome creature," she remarked. "Flitch, you called him. Is not that the name of the man who went out hunting with Alan Craig, Mr. Bullard? No wonder—"
"Look here!" said Bullard, and lifted the lid.
The woman's breath went in with a hiss. Unable to resist, her husband crept from his place and stood peering over her shoulder.
Bullard lifted out the shallow trays and laid them side by side. The room seemed to be filled with a new light.
"Six hundred thousand pounds," Bullard murmured.
"Oh!" exclaimed Mrs. Lancaster in a reverential whisper. Then she started violently. "Nothing—nothing," she added quickly, and went on gazing. She had remembered that she had not re-locked the door, though she had drawn the heavy curtain. But she could not tear herself yet awhile from that delicious spectacle of wealth.
They were all three fascinated.
After a while Bullard moved slightly. "May I choose a lucky one for you,
Mrs. Lancaster?" he asked, and picked out a fairly large stone.
He dropped it as though it had stung.
"What's this?"