“Still obstinate, still faithful to my enemies. Here, take this, it once shone in the crown of France. If that is not enough, I will send Zamara to the lord treasurer for gold. Only have some compassion, and do not leave me haunted by that awful prediction. Oh, it is terrible!” The countess took Gosner’s hand and attempted to force a large diamond on his little finger; but he resisted. A ring was already there, so singular in its form that it drew her attention. In a setting of rough gold was a small beetle cut from a chrysoprase gem, and engraved with hieroglyphics. The countess gave this ring a curious glance, and with eager violence attempted to draw it from his finger in order to give place for her diamond; but he tore his hand from her grasp, exclaiming passionately, “Not for ten thousand diamonds!” “Why? It is but a green stone spoiled by the graver; let me look at it.” “Lady, for your own sake, forbear. When this ring leaves my finger, it will be to carry sorrow and misfortune wherever it goes. With me, or any of my blood, it brings a blessing; away from us, nothing but evil will follow it.” The countess exhibited no haste to touch the ring again, but her eyes dwelt on it curiously, until a sort of fascination possessed her. In her intense interest she seemed to forget all that had passed before. “Tell me about it! Give me its history! In what way did it become possessed of this marvellous power of good and evil? “As for its history, I can tell you this much. An ancestor of mine, being warned of its existence by a power which I have no right to explain, found this stone in the sarcophagus of an Egyptian monarch, who had been inclosed in the marble many many thousand years. The gold which encircles it was found coiled around the finger of the mummy in the form of a serpent. This serpent seemed alive, its eyes were so bright and its jaws closed on the fangs with such a clinging grip. In this form my ancestor wore it during the rest of his life.” “And it gave him prosperity—happiness?” “I have said, madame, that it brings nothing but good to any man or woman who has a drop of my ancestor’s blood in his or her veins—nothing but evil to the person who has not. My ancestor, who lived centuries ago, believed that his own line ran back thousands of years through the man from whose tomb this chrysoprase was taken. He also believed that it possessed a supernatural influence on the possessor; and the ring has fallen to us from father to son as the most precious inheritance that ever descended for generations in one family.” “Always bringing happiness?” inquired the countess. “The man who wears this ring finds all knowledge easy to him—and knowledge to the men of our house is in itself happiness.” “But it is sure to carry mental blindness and ruin into any strange line?” “So the tradition connected with the ring assures us.” “Has it never passed out of the direct line?” “Once.” “And what happened?”