"I thought you were gone to the ends of the earth," I said lamely; "and
I was so afraid that I might lose it before I should have a chance of
returning it."
He took it gently and looked at it for a second. Then he kissed it.
"Why, it is warm from its resting-place," he said, "and so the dearer."
And then he took it off from its little chain and placed it in an inner
pocket of his coat, handing me back the chain.
"Maybe you'd like to see what picture it was that made me a trespasser,"
he said, with a suddenly reckless air. "Come, child, and you shall see.
Perhaps it was the discovery that the dead was come alive that sent off
two decent fellows to find a Spanish galleon without me. There are
better things than gold. Aye, faith, the gold on a woman's head, the
light in her eye, may be worth many treasure-ships."
We went back through the baize door through which he had come. There was
a second door within it which being opened disclosed the
picture-gallery; that, being lighted from overhead, had not the gloom of
the rest of the house.
I looked around me at the ruffled and periwigged gentlemen, the smiling
ladies, who were my ancestors and ancestresses, with interest.
"There is a picture of my grandmother here which I am said to resemble,"
I said, as I looked down the line of pictures, "though I am ashamed to
say that I am thought to resemble her, seeing that she is a great
beauty, and is, indeed, beautiful in her old age. Perhaps I resemble her
without possessing any of her beauty."
"Ah, Miss Bawn," he said, looking at me roguishly, "'handsome is as
handsome does.'"
"That is so," I said. "My grandmother has often told me that if I am
good and gentle no one will trouble about my looks."
He turned suddenly then and he said in a singularly sweet voice--
"Dear child! dear child!"
Then he took my hand as though I had been indeed a child and led me up
to the portrait.
"What do you see?" he asked.
"I never could be like anything so beautiful," I said, with indignation.
"If Gran looked like that she must have been beautiful indeed, and she
must have looked like it."
The young girl in the portrait was wearing a white satin gown. She was
painted in the manner of the period, with a lamb beside her which she
had wreathed with roses; and she stood in a flowery meadow. She had an
armful of roses like Flora's self, and as she stood one or two escaped
and fell down her dress. She had the long neck which has come to me, a
beautiful small head, golden hair, warm fair colouring and violet eyes.
"I never could be like it," I said again.
Captain Cardew smiled. I saw him take the miniature from his pocket and
look at it and again at the portrait as though he compared them.
"You see the likeness, do you not?" he asked.
"Yes, there is a likeness," I acknowledged.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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