“Nay, Miss Janice, ’t was the truth I told you, though a quibble, I own.  The miniature never was mine, tho’ ’t was once in my possession.”

“Then how came you by it?”

“I took it by force from—­never mind whom.”  The old bitter look was on the man’s face, and anger burned in his eyes.

“You stole it!” cried the girl, drawing away from him.

“Not I,” denied the man. “’T was taken from one who had less right to ’t than I.”

“You knew her?” questioned the girl.

“Ay,” cried the man, with a kind of desperation.  “I should think I did!”

“And—­and you—­you loved her?” she asked with a hesitancy which might mean that she was in doubt whether to ask the question, or perhaps that she rather hoped her surmise would prove wrong.

The young fellow halted in his work of trimming the ivory to fit the frame, and for a moment he stood, apparently looking down at his half-completed job, as it lay on the top of the meal-box.  Then suddenly he put his hand to his throat as if he were choking, and the next instant he leaned forward, and, burying his face in his arms, as they rested on the whilom desk, he struggled to stifle the sobs that shook his frame.

“Oh, I did n’t mean to pain you!” she cried in an agony of guilt and alarm.

Charles rose upright, and dashing his shirt sleeve across his eyes, he turned to the girl. “’T is over, Miss Janice,” he asserted, “and a great baby I was to give way to ’t.”

“I can understand, and I don’t think ’t was babyish,” said Janice, her heart wrung with sympathy for him.  “She is so lovely!”

The man’s lips quivered again, despite of his struggle to control himself.  “That she is,” he groaned.  “And I—­I loved her—­My God! how I loved her!  I thought her an angel from heaven; she was everything in life to me.  When I fled from London, it seemed as if my heart was—­was dead for ever.”

“She was untrue?” asked Janice, with a deep sigh.

The servant’s face darkened.  “So untrue—­Ah!  ’T is not to be spoken.  The two of them!”

“You challenged and killed him!” surmised Janice, excitedly.  “And that’s why you came to America.”

The groom shook his head sadly.  “Not that, Miss Janice.  They robbed me of both honour and revenge.  I was powerless to punish either—­except by—­Bah!  I’ve done with them for ever.”

“Foh mussy’s sakes, chile,” came Sukey’s voice, “what youse dam’ hyar?  Run quick, honey, foh your mah is ‘quirin’ foh youse.”

“Oh, Luddy!” cried the girl, reaching out for the miniature.

“’T is not done, but I’ll see to ’t that you get it this evening,” exclaimed Charles.

The girl turned and fled toward the house, closely followed by Sukey.

“Peg she come to de kitchen foh youse,” the cook explained; “an’ ‘cause I dun see youse go out de back do’, I specks whar youse gwine, an’ I sens her back to say dat young missus helpin’ ole Sukey, an’ be in pretty quick, an’ so dey never know.”