The servant recoiled a step as she held it out to him. Then snatching rather than taking the trinket from her hand, he said, “That is no place for this.”
“Why not?” asked Janice.
“Because she is unfit to rest there,” cried the man. He pulled out a knife, and with the blade pried up the rim, and shook free the protective glass and slip of ivory. “Now ’t is purged of all wrong,” he said, touching the setting to his lips. “I would it were for me to keep, for ’t has lain near your heart, and ’t is still warm with happiness.”
The speech and act so embarrassed Janice that she hurriedly said, “I really must n’t stay. I’ve been too long as ’t is, and—”
“’T will take but a moment,” the servant assured her hastily. “Wilt please give me t’ other one?” Throwing the miniature he had taken from the frame on the floor, he set about removing that of Janice from its wooden casing and fitting it to its new setting.
“Don’t,” cried Janice, in alarm, stooping to pick up the slip of ivory. “’T is not owing to you that ’t was n’t spoiled,” she added indignantly, after a glance at it.
“Small loss if ’t were!” responded the man, bitterly. “Promise me, Miss Janice, that you’ll not henceforth carry it in your bosom?”
“’T is a monstrous strange thing to ask.”
“I tell thee she’s not fit to rest near a pure heart.”
“How know you that?”