As Poppea stood before the chest of drawers to braid her straggling hair, her eyes fell on the miniature. Seizing it, she gazed at the face intently, and then, with dilating eyes, turned to Mrs. Latimer.
"Who is it?" she whispered; "how did it come here?"
"You brought it with you about your neck the night you came. We do not know, Daddy and I; we can't be sure, but we think it must have been your mother."
Without speaking, Poppea looked at it once more, put her hand to her face as though struggling intently with memory, pressed the picture to her lips, and then slipped the chain about her neck.
Lying back between the white curtains with the flowery counterpane across her breast, her loosely braided hair wreathing her head, the resemblance to the miniature became almost startling, but Jeanne Latimer put a restraint upon her tongue and all she wished to say. Stooping, she quickly kissed Poppea good-night.
"Shall I never know anything more?" Poppea asked pleadingly; "isn't there anything to tell except that I am not me—that I don't belong to them?"
"Yes, a little more, but the telling of that belongs to Daddy." Then even as Mrs. Latimer spoke, Poppea's expression changed, the mouth hardened, and a rigid expression mantled the delicate features, that remained after the long fringed lashes shut out the changeful fire of her eyes.
Waiting a moment to see if they would open again, Mrs. Latimer tiptoed out.
From forcing her eyes shut, Poppea really dozed, and only awakened as the candles gave their final splutter before going out. Mack lay upon the mat before the fire twitching and whining in his sleep. Starting up, she felt, rather than saw, that there was some one in the room. Peering around the curtain, she came face to face with Oliver Gilbert, who, wrapped in his double gown, was sitting in the deep chintz chair by her bedside.
Instantly a long, thin hand was laid upon hers that struggled under it for a moment but could not pull itself away.