"It is secured by a hidden spring," replied the viscountess. "If you can discover the secret, you will be doing me a favour, for I have never been able to open it myself."
"Then you do not know what treasure it may contain," smiled Beatrice. "Attar of roses, spices from Arabia, pearls from the Orient, may lurk within." She shook the urn, and a faint sound accompanied the movement. "Listen! there is certainly something inside."
"I am full of curiosity myself to know what it is," said Lorelie, "I have spent hours in trying to discover the spring."
"Then it is useless for me to try."
But though Beatrice spoke thus, she nevertheless made the attempt, toying with the vase and pressing various figures sculptured upon the sides. All to no purpose. The jewels sparkled like wicked eyes, seeming to mock her endeavours. The sound caused by the shaking of the urn was like the collision of paper pellets, shavings of wood, or of some other substance equally light. And all the time while handling the vase Beatrice was conscious of a strange feeling of repulsion. What caused it she could not tell: the fact was certain: the reason inexplicable.
"Is this vase an heirloom?" she asked, desirous of learning whence Lorelie had obtained it, and yet not liking to appear too curious.
The viscountess hesitated a moment, evidently adverse to replying, and then stooped over Beatrice and kissed her.
"Will you think me discourteous, Beatrice, if—if I do not tell you how I came by it?"
While speaking she glanced aside at Ivar who, from his position on the couch, was watching the scene with so perturbed an air that Idris was led to believe there was some strange secret connected with this vase—a secret known to both husband and wife. Great as was his love for Lorelie, Idris was compelled to admit that she was very mysterious in some of her ways.