the guard, who had long been a member of the council of
justice, exclaimed:

"By my soul, a splendid stone! There is the heathen god Eros with his
winged sweetheart Psyche smiling in his face. Did you never read that
pretty story by Apuleius--'The Golden Ass' it is called? The passage is
in that. Holy Luke! how finely it is carved. The lady has taken out the
wrong necklace. Look, Gamaliel, where could your green pigeon's egg have
found a place in that thing?" and he pointed to the gem.

"Nowhere," said the Jew. "The noble lady..." But Orion roughly bid the
witness to be silent, and Nilus, taking up the engraved gem, examined
it closely. Then he--he the grave, just man, on whose support Paula had
confidently reckoned--went up to her and with a regretful shrug asked
her whether the other necklace with the setting of which she had spoken
was in the trunk.

The blood ran cold in her veins. This thing that had happened was as
startling as a miracle. But no! No higher Power had anything to do
with this blow. Orion believed that she had failed in her promise of
screening him by her silence, and this, this was his revenge. By what
means--how he had gone to work, was a mystery. What a trick!--and it had
succeeded! But should she take it like a patient child? No. A thousand
times no! Suddenly all her old powers of resistance came back; hatred
steeled her wavering will; and, as in fancy, he had seen himself in
the circus, driving in a race, so she pictured herself seated at the
chess-board. She felt herself playing with all her might to win; but
not, as with his father, for flowers, trifling presents or mere glory;
nay, for a very different stake Life or Death!

She would do everything, anything to conquer him; and yet, no--come what
might--not everything. Sooner would she succumb than betray him as
the thief or reveal what she had discovered in the viridarium. She had
promised to keep the secret; and she would repay the father's kindness
by screening the son from this disgrace. How beautiful, how noble
had Orion's image been in her heart. She would not stain it with this
disgrace in her own eyes and in those of the world. But every other
reservation must be cast far, far away, to snatch the victory from him
and to save Hiram. Every fair weapon she might use; only this treachery
she could not, might not have recourse to. He must be made to feel
that she was more magnanimous than he; that she, under all conceivable
circumstance