er he
could not take eight hundred francs for the bracelet.

She accosted him in French, for that is the language of Geneva; and the
two ladies had talked very freely to each other in English, supposing
that neither the shopkeeper nor the new party of customers would
understand what they were saying. But it happened that the shopkeeper
himself, as well as Mr. and Mrs. Holiday, understood English very well,
and thus he knew the meaning of all that the ladies had been saying; and
he was too well acquainted with human nature not to know that the end of
such a consultation and deliberation as that would be the purchase of
the bracelet, and was therefore not at all disposed to abate the price.

"No, madam," said he, speaking in French, and in a very polite and
obliging manner; "I cannot vary from the price I named at all. We are
obliged to adopt the system of having only one price here. Besides,
that bracelet could not possibly be afforded for less than a thousand
francs. Earlier in the season we asked twelve hundred francs for it; and
I assure you, madam, that it is a great bargain at a thousand."

After looking at the bracelet a little longer, and holding it up again
in different lights, and hearing her friend's solicitations that she
would purchase it repeated in various forms, Almira finally concluded to
take it.

It may seem, at first view, that Almira's friend evinced a great deal of
generosity in urging her thus to buy an ornament more rich and costly
than she could hope to purchase for herself; but her secret motive was
not a generous one at all. She wished to quote Almira's example to her
own husband, as a justification for her having bought a richer piece of
jewelry than he would otherwise have approved of.

"Mine only cost eight hundred francs," she was going to say; "and cousin
Almira bought one that cost a thousand."

In this way she hoped to exhibit to her husband that which he might
otherwise have regarded as foolish extravagance in the light of
self-denial and prudent economy.

In the mean time, while Almira and her friend had been making their
purchases at the table, another shopman had been displaying a great
many trays to Mrs. Holiday on one of the counters. The ornaments
contained in these trays were by no means as costly as those which had
been shown to the two ladies at the table; for Mrs. Holiday had said to
the shopman, as she came in, that she wished to see only some simple
pins and other orn