"Thank you, dear. And you must know, Blue Bonnet, without my telling you how great a comfort you are to me."
"Truly, Grandmother,—a comfort?"
"Beyond words, dear." And Grandmother gave her another kiss to grow on. "And now, Blue Bonnet, here is something for your birthday."
Blue Bonnet took the dainty package and unwrapped it with fingers that trembled a little. Within the paper was a box, and inside that, looking out from a frame of dull Roman gold, was her mother's face. It was an exquisite miniature, painted on ivory. The rose-tints of the flesh and the deep tender blue of the eyes that smiled up at her, made the portrait seem a living thing. Blue Bonnet could not speak. She gazed and gazed at the dear features until her eyes blurred and she had to put up her hand to brush the tears away.
"Oh, Grandmother—!" Her lip quivered and she could say no more.
But Grandmother understood.
"Your aunt had it done from a photograph while she was in Rome. The painter was a Boston woman—an old friend of ours who knew your mother, Blue Bonnet. That is why the coloring is so true. The eyes are your eyes—can't you see, dear?"
"Am I truly like her?"
"So like, Blue Bonnet, that sometimes it seems as if Elizabeth had never left me."
"I'm glad, Grandmother. Oh, how I shall treasure this! How can I ever thank you and Aunt Lucinda? There come the others,—I think I won't show them this just now. I'd rather let them see it one at a time. Somehow a crowd—"