A Duel. Richard Marsh
wouldn't take long to make an end of you."
By degrees he regained the use of his attenuated voice.
"I do want careful handling--that's so. Still I wouldn't murder me if I were you--it would be murder. Murder has to be paid for in full. It would be hardly worth your while to be compelled to render full payment for such a remnant as I am. Have you got the case? Open it."
She held a square Russia leather case, in corn-flower blue. She looked for a spring or for something which would enable her to get at its interior, but found nothing.
"Does it open? I don't see how."
"It's a little idea of my own that spring. I didn't want any one to see what is inside but me. But it's so long since I've seen that I have grown hungry for a look, so you shall have one too. I think I should like you to have one. Hold the case between your finger and thumb, one of them exactly in the centre of each side, then press firmly."
Obeying him, immediately one of the sides flew open in the middle, revealing, framed in the other, the miniature of a young girl. Isabel was no artist; she was incapable of appreciating the artistic value of the portrait which confronted her. What struck her instantly was that it was surrounded by what looked like three rows of precious stones--pearls, sapphires, diamonds.
"Are they real?" she inquired.
"Do you mean the stones in the setting? They are. The pearls are there because she is the queen of pearls; the sapphires, because they are her favourite stones; the diamonds, because I chose to have them."
"They must be very valuable."
"They cost a lot of money, and they'd fetch a lot. That is the girl I wanted to marry me. What do you think of her?"
"She is pretty."
"Pretty! She's beautiful."
"She's too fair for me."
"That's because you're dark. I hate dark women--always have done. Hold the case open in front of me. Let me look at her."
She did as he asked. No change took place in his expression; none could take place. His voice remained the same; that also was incapable of modulation. Yet she knew that an alteration had taken place in him; that as he gazed the man of whom he had spoken, who was inside him somewhere, was stirred to his inmost depths.
"Not beautiful! She's the most beautiful creature in the world. She always has been; she always will be. God bless her! though He has been hard on me." Then, after a pause, "Take the case away and shut it, and put it back beneath my pillow--gently. That glimpse will last me a long time, thank you. Though I may never look at her again, her face will be with me always to the end. Before you close the case you might look at her again more carefully. Perhaps, after you have gazed at her attentively, understanding may come to you; you may begin to perceive the beauty which was hidden from you at the first."
She returned, the case still open in her hand, to the window in front of which she had been standing.
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