'Not quite all. In the old days I flung away everything for the Way of Wealth and the Way of Pleasure—as I thought. Good Heavens! What Wealth came to me? What Pleasure? Well, Armorel, in your presence I now throw away the wealth. Since you will not have it, I will not.'
He seized the case as if he would throw it overboard. She leaned forward eagerly and stopped him.
'Will you really do this, Roland? Stop a moment. Think. It is a great sacrifice. You might use that wealth for all kinds of good and useful things. You could command the making of beautiful things: you could help yourself in your Art: you could travel and study—you could do a great deal, you know, with all this money. Think, before you do what can never be undone.'
Roland, for reply, laid the rubies again in her lap. It was as if one should bring a Trespass offering and lay it upon the altar. The case was open, and the light was still strong enough overhead for the rubies to be seen in a glittering heap.
He took them up again. 'Do you consent, Armorel?'
She bowed her head.
He took a handful of the stones and dropped them in the water. There was a little splash, and the precious stones, the fortune of Robert Fletcher, the gems of the Burmah mines, dropped like a shower upon the surface. They were, as we know, nothing but bits of paste and glass, but this he did not know. And therefore the Trespass offering was rich and precious. Then he took the silken kerchief which had wrapped them and threw the rest away, as one throws into the sea a handful of pebbles picked up on the beach.
'So,' he said, 'that is done. And now I am poor again. You shall keep the empty case, Armorel, if you like.'
'No—no. I do not want even the case. I want never to be reminded again of the rubies and the story of Robert Fletcher.' Roland dipped the oars again, and with two or three vigorous strokes pulled the boat out of the dark channel—the tomb of his wealth—into the open water beyond. There in the dying light the puffins swam and dived, and the sea-gulls screamed as they flew overhead, and on the edge of the rocks the shags stood in meditative rows.