“I wish to remember you as you are now!” he exclaimed—“lying back in my chair, your face a little in profile, your eyes sad and compassionate. When you are gone I shall keep this memory in my heart; I shall cherish it; it shall live with me here in my solitude.”
“I must go,” she said, with a little thrill of anger or agitation in her voice. “I have stayed too long already.”
He came towards her.
“I want first to show you this,” he said, drawing from his pocket a jewel-case, which he almost forced into her hands. “You will not refuse me a last favour—you who have accorded me so many?”
She avoided his glance, and opened the box, giving, as she did so, an exclamation of astonishment.
It was full of rings.
“They were my poor mother’s,” he explained. “By special permission I was allowed to receive them here; I feared they might go astray.”
There were, perhaps, ten rings in all, every one the choice of a woman of refinement and great wealth—diamonds, rubies, pearls, and opals, sparkling and burning in the hollow of the girl’s hand. No wonder she cried out at the sight of them, and turned them over and over and over with fascinated curiosity.
“Each one has its history,” said de Charruel. “This and this are heirlooms. This was a peace-offering from my father after a terrible quarrel, the particulars of which I never learned. This he gave her after my birth—are the diamonds not superb? This ruby was my mother’s favourite, for it was her engagement ring, and endeared to her by innumerable recollections. She used to tell me that at her death she wished my wife to wear it always, saying it was so charged with love that she counted it a talisman.”
Miss Coulstoun held it up to the light, turning it from side to side.