It was a portrait of Ralph Davenant in his best--and worst--days. It had been painted when men wore their hair long, and brushed from their foreheads. One hand, white as the driven snow, was thrust in his breast, the other held a riding-whip. Una looked at it long and earnestly, and Mrs. Davenant, impressed by her long silence, rose and stood beside her. "Yes," she said, "that is Ralph Davenant. It was painted when he was about your age, my dear. Ah----" "What is the matter?" Mrs. Davenant, pale and excited, took up a hand-mirror from one of the tables and held it in front of Una. "Look!" she exclaimed. "Well?" she said. "Well?" echoed Mrs. Davenant. "Don't you see? Look again. The very image! It is himself come to life again; it is Ralph Davenant turned woman!" she exclaimed. And before Una could glance at the glass a second time Mrs. Davenant threw it aside. "Am I so like?" said Una, with a smile. "How mysterious! And that is so beautiful a face." "Beautiful eyes, and you are----" said Mrs. Davenant, but stopped in time, warned by Una's frank, questioning gaze. "If you like to look at portraits," she said, "there is an album there; look over that." Una took up the album and turned over its pages; suddenly she stopped, and the color flew to her face. With unconcealed eagerness she came toward Mrs. Davenant with the open album in her hand. "Look!" she said; "who is that?" "That," said Mrs. Davenant, peering at it, "that is--Jack Newcombe." "Jack Newcombe," said Una, breathlessly. "You know him?" "Yes," said Mrs. Davenant, with a sigh. "Poor Jack! Shut the book, my dear." "Why do you say 'Poor Jack?'" said Una, with a hollow look in her beautiful eyes. "Because--because he is a wicked young man, my dear," said Mrs. Davenant. "Poor Jack!" CHAPTER XV. Amidst a profound silence Jack walked slowly and quietly out of the house. There was no anger in his heart against the old man whose favorite he had once been--for the moment there was scarcely any anger against Stephen; surprise and bewilderment overwhelmed every other feeling. He had not expected a large sum of money--had certainly not expected the Hurst; and but for the words spoken by the dying man, he would not have expected anything at all, after having offended him in the matter of the money-lenders and the post-obit. But most assuredly the squire had intimated that there would be something--something, however small. And now he was told that there was nothing, that his name was not even mentioned. Apart from any mercenary consideration, Jack was cut up and disappointed; if there had been a simple mourning ring, a few of the old guns out of the armory--anything as a token of the old man's forgiveness, he would have been satisfied; but nothing, not one word.