Let the beautiful prophetess keep the agate, and take the opal too; for see, there is a charm on it also! The name by which Solomon compelled the demons to do his bidding.

Look! What might you not do now, if you knew how to use that! To have great glorious angels, with six wings each, bowing at your feet whensoever you called them, and saying, "Here am I, mistress; send me." Only look at it!' Hypatia took the tempting bait, and examined it with more curiosity than she would have wished to confess; while the old woman went on-- 'But the wise lady knows how to use the black agate, of course?
Aben-Ezra told her that, did he not ?' Hypatia blushed somewhat; she was ashamed to confess that Aben-Ezra had not revealed the secret to her, probably not believing that there was any, and that the talisman had been to her only a curious plaything, of which she liked to believe one day that it might possibly have some occult virtue, and the next day to laugh at the notion as unphilosophical and barbaric; so she answered, rather severely, that her secrets were her own property.
'Ah, then! she knows it all--the fortunate lady! And the talisman has told her whether Heraclian has lost or won Rome by this time, and whether she is to be the mother of a new dynasty of Ptolemies, or to die a virgin, which the Four Angels avert! And surely she has had the great demon come to her already, when she rubbed the flat side, has she not ?' 'Go, foolish woman! I am not like you, the dupe of childish superstitions.' 'Childish superstitions! Ha! ha! ha!'said the old woman, as she turned to go, with obeisances more lowly than ever.

'And she has not seen the Angels yet!....

Ah well! perhaps some day, when she wants to know how to use the talisman, the beautiful lady will condescend to let the poor old Jewess show her the way.' And Miriam disappeared down an alley, and plunged into the thickest shrubberies, while the three dreamers went on their way.
Little thought Hypatia that the moment the old woman had found herself alone, she had dashed herself down on the turf, rolling and biting at the leaves like an infuriated wild beast.....

'I will have it yet! I will have it, if I tear out her heart with it!'.