Strong man as he was, the shock almost overcame him. He reached out his hand and grasped the back of a chair. Tears welled up in his eyes. The auctioneer had been watching him closely. "You seem to like it, Mr. Gregg." "Yes," answered Adam in restrained, measured tones. "Yes, very much. But you have been misinformed; it is not by Gilbert Stuart. It is by a man I know, I saw him paint it. Tell Mr. Morlon so. Send it to my studio, please, and credit this gentleman with the commission--I'll buy it for old association's sake." That night, when it grew quite dark, he took the portrait from where the cartman had left it in his studio with its face to the wall--never again would it suffer that indignity--and placed it under his skylight. He wanted to see what the fading light would do--whether the changed colors would once more unlock the secrets of a soul. Again, as in the dim shimmer of the dawn, there struggled out from the wonderful eyes that same pleading look--the look he had seen on its face the morning he had left Derwood Manor--as if she needed help and was appealing to him for sympathy. Then he flashed up the circle of gas jets, flooding the studio with light. Instantly all her joyousness returned. Once more there shone out the old happy smile and laughing eyes. Loosening the nails that held the canvas, he freed the portrait from its gaudy frame, and with the remark--"It was unframed when I kissed it last," placed it over the mantel moving some curios out of the way so it would rest the more firmly; then he dropped into a chair before it. He was in the past again--twenty-five years before, living once more the long hours in the garret with its background of blossoms; roaming the woods; listening to the sound of her joyous laughter when she caught little Phil to her breast. Then there rang in his ear that terrible moan when Judge Colton denounced them both; and the sob in her voice as she sank at his feet that night. He could catch the very perfume of her hair and feel the hot tears on his hand. If only the lips would open and once more whisper his name! What had sent her back, to soothe him with her beauty? His whole life passed in review--his hopes, his ambitions, his struggles; the years of loneliness, of misunderstanding, and the final triumph--a triumph made all the more bitter by a fate which had prevented her sharing it with him. With this there arose in his mind the picture of two gaunt chimneys outlined against a cold, gray sky; the trees bare of leaves, the grass shrivelled and brown--and then, like a refrain, came the long-forgotten song: "Weep no mo', me lady." Raising himself to his feet he leaned over the mantel and looked long and steadily into the eyes of the portrait. "Olivia," he whispered--in a voice that was barely audible--"I did not intend to be cruel. Forgive me, dear; there was nothing else to do--it was the only way, my darling!"