“Stop!” shouted Brood in an awful voice. His clenched hands were raised above his head. “The time has come for me to tell you the truth about this innocent mother of yours. Luck is with you. I am not your father. You are------” “Wait! If you are going to tell me that my mother was not a good woman, I want to go on record in advance of anything you may say, as being glad that I am her son no matter who my father was. I am glad that she loved me because I was her child, and if you are not my father, then I still have the joy of knowing that she loved some one man well enough to------” He broke off the bitter sentence and with nervous fingers drew a small leather case from his waistcoat pocket. “Before you go any farther, take one look at her face. It will make you ashamed of yourself. Can you stand there and lie about her after looking into------” He was holding the window curtains apart, and a stream of light fell upon the lovely face, so small that Brood was obliged to come quite close to be able to see it. His eyes were distended. “It is not Matilde--it is like her, but--yes, yes; it is Matilde! I must be losing my mind to have thought------” He wiped his brow. “But it was startling--positively uncanny.” He spoke as to himself, apparently forgetting that he had a listener. “Well, can you lie about her now?” demanded Frederic. Brood was still staring, as if fascinated, at the tiny photograph. “But I have never seen that picture before. She never had one so small as that. It------” “It was made in Vienna,” interrupted Frederic, not without a strange thrill of satisfaction in his soul, “and before you were married, I'd say. On the back of it is written 'To my own sweetheart,' in Hungarian, Yvonne says. There! Look at her. She was like that when you married her. How adorable she must have been. 'To my own sweetheart'! O--ho!” A hoarse cry of rage and pain burst from Brood's lips. The world grew red before his eyes. “'To my own sweetheart'!” he cried out. He sprang forward and struck the photograph from Frederic's hand. It fell to the floor at his feet. Before the young man could recover from his surprise, Brood's foot was upon the bit of cardboard. “Don't raise your hand to me! Don't you dare to strike me! Now I shall tell you who that sweetheart was!” Half an hour later James Brood descended the stairs alone. He went straight to the library, where he knew that he could find Yvonne. Ranjab, standing in the hall, peered into his white, drawn face as he passed, and started forward as if to speak to him. But Brood did not see him. He did not lift his gaze from the floor. The Hindu went swiftly up the stairs, a deep dread in his soul. The shades were down. Brood stopped inside the door and looked dully about the library. He was on the point of retiring when Yvonne spoke to him out of the shadowy corner beyond the fireplace.