"There is a long story connected with that diamond, Sire, and if your Majesty cares to hear it, I will tell it you. The diamond and I are old acquaintances, for this is the third time it has passed through my hands. In the first place, I set it in the tiara of our Holy Father, the Pope, where its effect was marvellous; then, by order of Clement VII., I mounted it upon a missal which his Holiness presented to the Emperor Charles V.; and as the Emperor desired to carry it constantly about him, as a resource doubtless in an emergency, I set the diamond, which is worth more than a million, in a ring, Sire. Hid not your Majesty observe it on the hand of your cousin, the Emperor?" "Yes, I remember," cried the king; "yes, on the day of our first interview he had it on his finger. How comes the diamond in your possession, duchess!" "Yes, tell us," cried Diane, whose eyes shone with joy, "how came it about that a diamond of that value passed from the Emperor's hands to yours?" "If the question were put to you, madame," retorted Madame d'Etampes, "the answer would not be far to seek, assuming that you confess certain matters to any other than your confessor." "You do not answer the king's question, madame," rejoined Diane. "Yes," said François, "how comes the diamond in your possession?" "Ask Benvenuto," said Madame d'Etampes, hurling a last defiance at her enemy; "Benvenuto will tell you." "Tell me, then," said the king, "and instantly: I am weary of waiting." "Very good, Sire," said Benvenuto; "I must confess to your Majesty that at sight of this diamond strange suspicions awoke in my mind, as in yours. It was while Madame d'Etampes and myself were at enmity, you must know, and I should not have been sorry to learn some little secret which might injure her in your Majesty's eyes. So I followed the scent, and I learned--" "You learned?" Benvenuto glanced hastily at the duchess, and saw that she was smiling. The power of resistance which she manifested pleased him, and, instead of putting an end to the struggle brutally with one stroke, he resolved to prolong it, like au athlete, sure of victory in the end, who, having fallen in with an antagonist worthy of him, resolves to display all his strength and all his skill. "You learned--" the king repeated. "I learned that she purchased it of Manasseh, the Jew. Yes, Sire, know this and govern yourself accordingly: it seems that since he entered France your cousin, the Emperor, has scattered so much money along the road, that he is reduced to putting his diamonds in pawn; and Madame d'Etampes, with royal magnificence, gathers in what the imperial poverty cannot retain."