"All you have--?"
"That belonged to her."
He swelled a little, then looked about him as if to appeal-as against her avidity--to the whole poor place. "Well,
what else do you want?"
"Nothing. Thank you very much." With which she bent
her eyes on the article wrapped, and now only exposed,
in her superannuated satchel--a string of large pearls,
such a shining circle as might once have graced the
neck of a provincial Ophelia and borne company to a
flaxen wig. "This perhaps IS worth something. Feel it."
And she passed him the necklace, the weight of which
she had gathered for a moment into her hand.
He measured it in the same way with his own, but
remained quite detached. "Worth at most thirty shillings."
"Not more?"
"Surely not if it's paste?"
"But IS it paste?"
He gave a small sniff of impatience. "Pearls nearly as big
as filberts?"
"But they're heavy," Charlotte declared.
"No heavier than anything else." And he gave them back
with an allowance for her simplicity. "Do you imagine for
9
HYLAND
