"There ain't no answer," Calvin said, and she waited for him to go before she opened it. She read it and sat there drained of all feeling. She was as white as the roses on her table. She read the note again and her hands shook. "Flora is very ill. We are taking her up to New York. After that we shall go to the North Shore. There isn't time for me to come and say; 'Good-bye.' Perhaps it is better not to come. It has been a wonderful summer, and it is you who have made it wonderful for me. The memory will linger with me always--like a sweet dream or a rare old tale. I am sending yon a little token--for remembrance. Think of me sometimes, Becky." That was all, except a scrawled "G. D." at the end. No word of coming back. No word of writing to her again. No word of any future in which she would have a part. She opened the box. Within on a slender chain was a pendant--a square sapphire set in platinum, and surrounded by diamonds. George had ordered it in anticipation of this crisis. He had, hitherto, found such things rather effective in the cure of broken hearts. Now, had George but known it, Becky had jewels in leather cases in the vaults of her bank which put his sapphire trinket to shame. There were the diamonds in which a Meredith great-grandmother had been presented at the Court of St. James, and there were the pearls of which her own string was a small part. There were emeralds and rubies, old corals and jade--not for nothing had the Admiral sailed the seas, bringing back from China and India lovely things for the woman he loved. And now the jewels were Becky's, and she had not cared for them in the least. If George had loved her she would have cherished his sapphire more than all the rest. But he did not love her. She knew it in that moment. All of her doubts were confirmed. The thing that had happened to her seemed incredible. She put the sapphire back in its box, wrapped it, tied the string carefully and called Mandy. "Tell Calvin to take this to Mr. Dalton." Mandy knew at once that something was wrong. But this was not a moment for words. The Bannisters did not talk about things that troubled them. They held their heads high. And Becky's was high at this moment, and her eyes were blazing. As she sat there, tense, Becky wondered what Dalton could have thought of her. If she had not had a jewel in the world, she would not have kept his sapphire. Didn't he know that? But how could he know? To him it had been "a sweet dream--a rare old tale," and she had thought him a Romeo ready to die for her sake, an Aucassin--willing to brave Hell rather than give her up, a Lohengrin sent from Heaven! She shuddered and hid her face in her hands. At last she crept into bed. Mandy, coming in to straighten the room, was told to lower the curtains. "My--my head aches, Mandy."