Colin looked at that radiant face, still fresh as morning, and for the first time he consciously noticed the sapphire that buckled his cloak. That gave the measure of his absorption in Dennis himself, for he had given him the stone to wear with a definite object. And now he saw how stale and unluminous it was. No blaze of light burned within it, its brilliance was dim compared to what it could be: it was splendid still, but no more than a shadow of its real self. He knew his own idea about the stone to be quite fantastic, but he felt a sudden spasm of anger with the boy that that great blue cornflower was so faded. Yet he felt he might have known it.... “No, I’ll see you to bed,” he said. “Here we are; turn up the light.” The room flashed into brightness and Colin closed the door. “Undo your cloak, Dennis,” he said, “and give me the sapphire.” The boy stood in the full light of the lamp above the dressing-table, fumbling with it. “Rather,” he said. “It’s like a bit of ice on my throat. I almost took it off during the ball, but I supposed it wasn’t a thing to leave about.... Oh, I can’t unfasten it: do it for me, Father.” He held his head up, smiling into his father’s eyes; and moved by some uncontrollable impulse Colin kissed that smooth cheek. The boy was so splendidly handsome, of so winning a charm. “And after all,” as Colin thought to himself, as if in excuse of the affection of that caress, “he’s my own son....” Then he raised his hands to undo the fastening at which Dennis fumbled, and even as he touched it, light seemed to dawn somewhere deep in the heart of the sapphire. “There you are,” he said, “there’s the ice-bag removed. It doesn’t look much like ice, does it?” Dennis shook off his cloak. “O-oh! It doesn’t look very icy,” he said. “Have I really been wearing that all evening? Why, it’s alive, it’s burning! Or is it only that it looks so bright against your black clothes? You ought to have worn it. Tell me about it: you said you would!” Colin looked at the rays that danced in that blue furnace that he held. It was scarcely possible to believe that this awakened lustre was purely an imagined effect, and not imagined surely was the counsel that its splendour gave him to tell Dennis a little more about his birthright. “Well, it was the last thing and the most splendid that the Queen ever gave old Colin,” he said. “He speaks of it in his Memoirs, which I’ll shew you----” “Oh do; shew me them to-morrow. I should love to see them. The old rip! Sorry, Father: about the sapphire.” Colin let his eyes rest again on the great stone, and then looked straight at Dennis. “He says that his Lord and Benefactor caused him so mightily to please the Queen that she gave it him,” he said. “You must learn to love it, Dennis, for he calls it the finest fruit of his bargain.” Dennis looked puzzled. “His bargain?” he asked. “Oh, the legend. Then do you think he really believed in the legend?”