"Say; you speak English. By heavens! you look like him. Did you ever know a Colonel Valois, of California?" He gazes at the boy eagerly.
"I never met him, sir, but he was the last of my family. He was killed in the Southern war."
"Look here, young man, you pack up them there paint-brushes, and send that picture down to my rooms. You've got to dine with me to-night, my boy. I'll give you a dinner to open your eyes."
The painter really opens his eyes in amazement.
"You knew my relative in California?"
"We dug this gold together," the stranger almost shouts, as he taps his huge watch-chain. "We were old pardners," he says, with a moistened eye.
There was a huskiness in the man's voice; not born of the mellow cognac he loved.
No; Joe Woods was far away then, in the days of his sturdy youth. He was swinging the pick once more on the bars of the American River, and listening to its music rippling along under the giant pines of California.
The young painter's form brought back to "Honest Joe" the unreturning brave, the chum of his happiest days.
Armand murmurs, "Are you sure you wish this picture?"