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The light grew until it glowed with the fire of opals; through the tree-tops ran little stirs of wakefulness, and all about him were faint, furtive rustlings and whispers of the new day. Then in this glorified dusk of the dawn a squirrel loosed his bark of alarm, a crested jay screamed in answer, and he knew his hour of atonement was come.
It was now sunset, and a golden glow lay upon the waters till they broke along the beach like great waves of pearls and opals drifting over the Sound together, and melting in the sand. Near the two men was a winrow of black seaweed, on which great drops of spray were quivering. Something in the appearance of this dark mass arrested Tom's attention.
Out they came, handfuls of gauds that he had given her in real affection: a jade necklace and bracelet of pale apple-green set in spun gold, with clasps of white ivory; a necklace of pearls, assorted as to size and matched in color, that shone with a tinted, pearly flame in the evening light; a handful of rings and brooches, diamonds, rubies, opals, amethysts; a dog-collar of emeralds, and a diamond hair-ornament.
What struck us most was the lovely iridescence which they all displayed in different lights. The vases in particular seemed to be carved out of living opals, yet each was large enough to contain several pints of liquor.
"We'll see, we'll see," he repeated musingly, and gazed away towards the cloud-enshrouded peaks in sombre silence the lines of his lips as sorrowful as those of an old lion dying in the desert, arrow-smitten and alone. He had forgotten the hand that pierced his heart. Thus dismissed, she rose, her eyes burning like deep opals in the parchment setting of her skin. "Life is so cruel!" she said.
There was a fine collection of opals of every size and color, among which were a number of huge flat black ones, indescribably gorgeous with their ever-changing peacock hues. But finest of all the lot were the pearls. Where old Don Esteban had secured these latter was a mystery, for he had not been a widely traveled man. They were splendid, unrivaled in size and luster.
When moonstones were first brought to the notice of Europeans, they were nearly as expensive as opals; now, they are sold by the pound or the hundred, for a few shillings the lot. Were all the diamonds to be put upon the market which are hoarded by certain large European dealers, those precious stones would diminish one half in value. Fashion and scarcity are the standards of value.
Smiling, but her beautiful lips mute, Marsa seemed to say to him: "Yes, it is the agraffe which you detached from your soldier's pelisse and gave to an unknown Tzigana near your father's grave." The silver ornament, incrusted with opals, recalled sharply to Prince Zilah that sad January night when the dead warrior had been laid in his last resting-place.
They also possessed the art of making glass highly refractive. Their table-ware surpassed in beauty all that I had ever previously seen. I saw tea cups as frail looking as soap bubbles, possessing the delicate iridescence of opals. Many other exquisite designs were the product of its flexibility and transparency.
Together they moved on as if borne by the wind, past many woods and silver-gleaming lakes, and mountains which shone like a range of opals below the purple skies.
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