Have a care, my brother Horace, lest
you reveal to the world that your immaculate relatives have been touching
pitch of the blackest hue and greatest tenacity. Prove me to be the vilest
of my sex, I remain none the less a wedded wife--your brother's wife--and
I defy you. The game is played out, and I have won it."
She threw herself back in her chair and cast on him a glance of insolent
disdain. Horace Rutherford looked at her with a scornful smile.
"The game is _not_ played out," he said, calmly. "One card remains in my
hand, and I produce it. It is the Ace of Diamonds, and its title is The
Rose of the Morning."
A livid paleness overspread Mrs. Rutherford's features, and a stifled cry
escaped from her lips. She half rose from her seat, but, seeming to
recollect herself, she sank back and covered her face with her hands.
Horace continued, after a momentary pause:
"My investigations into the history of the Count Wilhelm von Erlenstein
during the last years of his life revealed the fact that he had lost the
most valuable of the jewels of his family. It had been stolen. It was a
pink diamond of great size and beauty, known to gem-connoisseurs by the
name of The Rose of the Morning--one of those remarkable stones which have
a history and a pedigree, and which are as well known by reputation to
diamond-fanciers as are Raphael's Transfiguration and the Apollo Belvidere
to the lovers of art.
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