I pointed to the name scrawled in the corner.
"'Ruth Endicott,'" he read slowly. "Well, and who was she?"
"That's her portrait," I said. "Does it remind you of any one?"
He looked at it for a moment in silence; then he shook his head.
"No, I can't say that it does. But who was Ruth Endicott?"
"Nobody in particular—a distant relative of the Kingdons."
Godfrey gazed at me sceptically.
"Really?" he asked.
"Really. This was the last picture she painted—of herself. You see how crude it is."
"Crude—yes; but it's got power, Lester. The woman's there, somehow, looking right out of the canvas. Did she die?"