“Certainly he won’t do everything for you, or certainly you will not ask him—­which?” insisted Edmonson.

“Both.  I shall never test him, and I shall make no comments on what I may find on his walls.  Nor will you, Master Edmonson, for no gentleman would.”

“Do you object to my seeing it?” She looked at him wonderingly.

“Why should I, if it were open?  But I will tell you what I do object to, to my coming here and seeming to pry upon—­the family.  I wish it had been somebody else instead of me who had found it, or that it had never been found at all.  I beg you will spare me, Master Edmonson,” And she looked at him with the rare entreaty of a proud nature.

“Perhaps it’s not a picture after all,” he said.  “You may be mistaken.  Don’t you think so?”

“No,” she answered.  “I am not mistaken, but—.”

“Don’t fear that I shall speak one word,” he cried as she hesitated.  “I would sooner lose my life than annoy you, to say nothing of losing my amusement.  If I can’t see what is behind the hanging without doing that, why, I’ll not see it at all.”

“Thank you,” she said gratefully, dwelling only upon the first part of his speech.  “I was sure you would feel so.”

“Yes, words and questions would be a clumsy way.  I’ll show you a better.”  And while she looked at him wondering what he meant, he turned from her and in an instant, bringing up a chair, had stepped upon it and made with his penknife a line across what he judged would be the top of the picture.  Feeling along the length of this with his finger he cut a perpendicular line from each end of it, so that the tapestry fell down like the end of a broad ribbon, and showed that Elizabeth had not been at fault in her supposition.  He had stepped down from the chair, replaced it, and returned to her side while she still stood in dumb consternation.  He was smiling.  “There!” he said.  The thing had been done in a flash; he had scarcely glanced at the painting, until, as he spoke, he fell back a step.  Then he caught her arm.

“Look!” he cried hoarsely, “Look!”

But he need not have told her to look, she was doing it with eyes wide open and lips parted and motionless.  “I was right, you see.  I had a right to do this,” he said.

She drew away from the grasp that he still laid on her arm in his absorption.  “Yes, I was right,” he repeated.  “Do you see?”

“No,” she answered, “I understand nothing.  Explain yourself.  Or wait.  It is time now to call Colonel Archdale.  You will explain to him this liberty, and the meaning of this—­this strange coincidence.”

“Ah, ha!” he cried.  “You see it?  Everybody will see it; isn’t it so?  Tell me,” he insisted.

“I suppose so,” she faltered, looking at his triumphant face and feeling a presentiment that some evil was to fall upon the Archdale family.  If so she would have helped to bring it.

“Let us send for him,” repeated Edmonson.  “Or, no.  Let us surprise them all, give them an entertainment not planned by mine admirable host.  Come, let us go out into the garden, and when we return, here will be a new face to greet us.  That will be more as you wish it?  I want it to be as you wish.”