A sudden thought seemed to strike Doris.
“How stupid I must be,” she said, “not to have recollected before (though, mind you, even now I don’t know that it’s a matter of any consequence), that Mary Deane, the housemaid, when she was brushing and arranging some clothes which Mr. Launce had left behind him, found the photo of a young lady in one of the pockets of his overcoat. Mary dropped it in my room as she was dusting, and then told me all about it, and went and put it back where she had found it. Now do you think——”
Here Doris stopped and looked inquiringly at Hetty.
“It does not matter what I think,” replied the latter, “but you will be doing me a very great service indeed if you can obtain possession of the likeness and entrust it to me for one day. The next it shall be given back to you safe and sound. Will you do this for me?”
Doris would have done more than that had more been required of her, so worked upon had her feelings been by the tale told her by the other. At their next meeting the likeness was produced and handed over to Hetty.
“It’s a sweet face, don’t you think?” asked Doris, as Hetty stood gazing at the photograph with bent brows.
“It’s a beautiful face,” she replied, “and if Launce Keymer gave me up because he had the chance of winning this girl for his wife, I can hardly wonder at it. But he need not have robbed me of my letters.”
She bit her lip in an effort to keep back the tears which had sprung to her eyes.
On turning the portrait over she saw that it bore the name of a local photographer. This was so far fortunate for the purpose she had in view, although had it borne a London or even a Paris address she would have carried out her scheme in exactly the same way.
Turning to Doris she said: