“There!”—she said—“Mademoiselle called them ‘very chic,’ and aren’t they—aren’t they lovely?”
“They are sweet!” said Fanchon. “How curious of her to give them to you. Of course they can’t be real.”
“I know that, but it doesn’t matter a bit,” said Nina—“they look like real, and that’s the main thing. Poor dear Mademoiselle couldn’t afford real jewellery.”
“You think they look real,” said Fanchon. “Wait till you see—”
She had discovered the spot where Brenda kept the real key of the chest of drawers. She had watched carefully, and had seen her put it inside a broken vase on the top shelf of the over-mantel that very morning.
“Girls,” she said, “I have something to show you. Both of you go and bury your heads against your counterpanes. Kneel down by your beds, and don’t look, to save your lives. Then you will see something!”
The girls flew to obey. In a minute Fanchon had opened the drawer and had taken out the little precious box.
“Now you may look, and you must be quick!” she said. “Oh dear—it is weak of me even to show it—but when you see it—”
She opened the precious box and lifted out the bangle, which she supposed to be the real one. There was the blue stone, there was the clasp, and there was the rim of gold, but—Fanchon felt all the colour rushing madly up to her face, and then leaving it. The bangle was not her bangle! Oh, yes—she had studied it once or twice; she had observed its elegance, its dainty finish. “This—this—”
She looked wildly at her two sisters, who glanced at her in some wonder.