Mrs. Peniman laid her hand over the little shaking hands that were clasped against Nina's breast.
"Yes, dear, we have it." She rose and going to her trunk brought forth the box and put it into Nina's hands.
The girl clasped it, bent over it, pressed it to her bosom, and burst into a flood of tears.
"It is all I have of them," she whispered, "all that I have to remember either of them. Oh, I hope there is a picture of Mother in the box, some letters, something to make me know more about my dear, dear father and mother!"
At this moment Mr. Peniman entered the room. He crossed silently to the table and stood beside it while Nina with shaking fingers unfastened the thongs that were wound about the box and raised the lid. On the top were two long folded papers. She opened these and glanced at them hastily, then threw them on the table. They were deeds, executed many years before, to Lee C. Carroll, by his father, Edgar M. Carroll, conveying to him and his heirs forever sole title to certain properties in St. Louis and New York.
There was a tray in the box, and with trembling hands Nina raised this eagerly, hoping to find the treasures she had coveted in the space below.
There was nothing in it but a heap of ashes.
The base, vindictive nature of the renegade, while leaving in the box the deeds to a property he dared not claim, incited him with devilish malice to destroy all the personal papers, all data, every scrap of information that could lead to the restoration of the child to her friends and relatives, or her place in society.
When the full realization of what had been done came upon her Nina uttered a heartbroken cry and cast herself into Mrs. Peniman's arms.
With eyes that could scarce credit the evidence of their senses the man and woman gazed into the box.