"Never!" cried Jessie. "This is a mere dream. It's impossible to prove her descent from our stock. I can have nothing to do with her."
Her vehemence was such that another man might have suspected some underlying motive of feminine jealousy. But Lance merely laughed. "Oh, there's no legal claim involved," said he, lightly. "Of course, I don't expect that anything tremendous is going to happen, even if she does turn out to be of your blood. But suppose we appoint your father arbitrator as to this portrait?"
Jessie consented, and they referred the picture to Colonel Floyd.
"If this is a well-authenticated reproduction," said the colonel, deploying his finest hand-book manner, "the appearances would seem to indicate some connection. 'Pon my soul, I never noticed any resemblance till now; but while the similarity to our Jessie is perceptible, it is not nearly so pronounced as the likeness to this Adela Reefe. Is it possible that an inherited type of countenance should last so long, under such conditions? Very singular; very strange!"
He did not evince enthusiasm, and he paced the room restlessly.
"What we want is to go and see old Mr. Reefe," suggested Lance, "and ask him about Croatan."
The colonel fell in with this proposition; and on the morrow they rode down to Hunting Quarters. It was not an easy matter to draw Reefe into conversation; but they at last succeeded in pinning him down to facts, and, without discovering their purpose, he assured them that, to the best of his knowledge, his predecessors had lived in the region of Croatan, until the time of his father, who crossed Pamlico Sound and settled near Hunting Quarters. To make a clean breast of it, he also admitted that his stock probably contained Indian blood; but of this he was rather proud than otherwise.
"It is settled," said Lance, when he came to tell Jessie the result of the inquiry. "There can be no reasonable doubt now. I must go up and let Adela and Sylv know about it at once."
Jessie leaned back in her chair and fixed her mild gray eyes upon him. She had never looked more captivating than at that instant, the side-part in her hair giving an accent of dainty self-reliance to her whole pose and demeanor. "Let me ask you a question," she said.
"Willingly."