"Tell me," said I, "you had no help in this work?"
"You saw that I had none," she cried. "Look at the other crystals; there are five of them. You have seen them come straight from the crucible—and you know that I have succeeded. Will you buy my sapphire? Buy it in proof that I have conquered you. When you return to-morrow I will tell you everything. I am exhausted now. The work always excites me terribly. My nerves are all unstrung; I can do no more to-day."
"If you will sell me the stone you hold in those tongs, I will give you fifty pounds for it," I said, concluding that, even had I been tricked, a real jewel, and a very good one, was before my eyes. But at this promise she cried out with joy, and putting the stone in a little box with lightning speed, she handed it to me.
"Pay me to-morrow, any time," she said. "It was good of you to come here, and to listen to me. I am very grateful. When you come again you shall know all my secret. Only think well of me and be my friend."
With this she led the way quickly into her own room, and the lackey appeared in answer to her ring. The interview was at an end, abruptly as it seemed to me, and I left her with a strange feeling of dizziness, and my head burning with excitement—but her sapphire was in my pocket.
When I met Bracebridge, who was waiting in my room for me, he had an ugly leer upon his face.
"Well," said he, "I fancy my hundred's all right?"
"What hundred?"
"With Oldfield," said he. "I bet him a hundred she'd sell you a piece of glass for a sapphire; and I don't suppose you'll deny that she did it?"