"There, there." She was on her feet beside me and with a gentle yet compelling hand put me back in my chair. Her voice had the same tone a mother would use to a grieving child. "Dicky's name wasn't mentioned when the story was printed the last time, because at the time the divorce was granted, Mr. Morten withdrew the accusation that he had made against him."
"Why?" The question left my lips almost without volition. I sensed something tragic, full of meaning for me behind the statement she had made.
She did not answer me for a minute or two.
"I can only answer that question on your word of honor not to tell Dicky what I am going to tell you," she said. "It is something he suspects, but which I would never confirm."
She paused expectantly. "Upon honor, of course," I answered simply.
She rose and moved swiftly toward one of the built-in bookcases. I saw that she put her hand upon one of the sections and pulled upon it. To my astonishment it moved toward her, and I saw that behind it was a cleverly constructed wall safe. She turned the combination, opened the door and took from the safe an inlaid box which, as she came toward me, I saw was made of rare old woods.
She sat down again in the big chair and looked at the box musingly, tenderly. I leaned forward expectantly. Again I had the sense of tragedy near me.
Drawing the key from her dress she opened the box and took from it a miniature, gazed at it a minute, and then handed it to me.
"Oh, Mrs. Underwood," I exclaimed. "How exquisite."
The miniature was of the most beautiful child I had ever seen, a tiny girl of perhaps two years. She stood poised as if running to meet one, her baby arms outstretched. It was a picture to delight or break a mother's heart.