"There!" she continued, tossing the fragments upon the floor, "that is the last of that; I am sure! I don't know why I have kept the miserable thing all these years."
Mona could have cried aloud at this wanton destruction of what she would have regarded as priceless, but she dared make no sign, although she was trembling in every nerve.
"Is the lady living?" she ventured to inquire, as she turned away, apparently to fold a dress, but really to conceal the painful quivering of her lips.
"No. You can finish packing this trunk, then you may take these dresses to the sewing-room. You may begin ripping this brown one. And you may take the pieces of that picture down and tell Mary to burn them. I came up for a wrap; I am going for a drive."
Mrs. Montague secured her wrap, then swept from the room, walking fiercely over the torn portrait, looking as if she would have been glad to trample thus upon the living girl whom she had so hated.
Mona reverently gathered up the fragments, her lips quivering with pain and indignation.
She laid them carefully together, but a bitter sob burst from her at the sight of the great ragged tears across the beautiful face.
"Oh, mother, mother!" she murmured, "what an insult to you, and I was powerless to help it."
She finished her packing, then taking the dresses that were to be made over, and the torn picture, she went below.
She could not bear the thought of having that lovely face, marred though it was, consigned to the flames, yet she dare not disobey Mrs. Montague's command to give it to Mary to be burned.