nt object--for as "important" it
did somehow present itself--to produce its certain effect. Simple, but
singularly elegant, it stood on a circular foot, a short pedestal with a
slightly spreading base, and, though not of signal depth, justified its
title by the charm of its shape as well as by the tone of its surface.
It might have been a large goblet diminished, to the enhancement of its
happy curve, by half its original height. As formed of solid gold it was
impressive; it seemed indeed to warn off the prudent admirer. Charlotte,
with care, immediately took it up, while the Prince, who had after a
minute shifted his position again, regarded it from a distance.

It was heavier than Charlotte had thought. "Gold, really gold?" she
asked of their companion.

He hesitated. "Look a little, and perhaps you'll make out."

She looked, holding it up in both her fine hands, turning it to the
light. "It may be cheap for what it is, but it will be dear, I'm afraid,
for me."

"Well," said the man, "I can part with it for less than its value. I got
it, you see, for less."

"For how much then?"

Again he waited, always with his serene stare. "Do you like it then?"

Charlotte turned to her friend. "Do YOU like it?" He came no nearer; he
looked at their companion. "Cos'e?"

"Well, signori miei, if you must know, it's just a perfect crystal."

"Of course we must know, per Dio!" said the Prince. But he turned away
again--he went back to his glass door.

Charlotte set down the bowl; she was evidently taken. "Do you mean it's
cut out of a single crystal?"

"If it isn't I think I can promise you that you'll never find any joint
or any piecing."

She wondered. "Even if I were to scrape off the gold?"

He showed, though with due respect, that she amused him. "You couldn't
scrape it off--it has been too well put on; put on I don't know when and
I don't know how. But by some very fine old worker and by some beautiful
old process."

Charlotte, frankly charmed with the cup, smiled back at him now. "A lost
art?"

"Call it a lost art,"

"But of what time then is the whole thing?"

"Well, say also of a lost time."

The girl considered. "Then if it's so precious, how comes it to be
cheap?"

Her interlocutor once more hung fire, but by this time the Prince
had lost patience. "I'll wait for you out in the air," he said to his
companion, and, though he spoke without irritation, he pointed his
remark by passing immediately into