"A piece of sculpture," said Rosamond. "I did not notice it before. It is not very large, and not particularly attractive, according to my taste. So far as I can tell, it seems to be intended to represent—"
Leonard stopped her before she could say any more. "Let me try, for once, if I can't make a discovery for myself," he said, a little impatiently. "Let me try if my fingers won't tell me what this sculpture is meant to represent."
He passed his hands carefully over the bass-relief (Rosamond watching their slightest movement with silent interest, the while), considered a little, and said—
"Is there not a figure of a man sitting down, in the right-hand corner? And are there not rocks and trees, very stiffly done, high up, at the left-hand side?"
Rosamond looked at him tenderly, and smiled. "My poor dear!" she said. "Your man sitting down is, in reality, a miniature copy of the famous ancient statue of Niobe and her child; your rocks are marble imitations of clouds, and your stiffly done trees are arrows darting out from some invisible Jupiter or Apollo, or other heathen god. Ah, Lenny, Lenny! you can't trust your touch, love, as you can trust me!"
A momentary shade of vexation passed across his face; but it vanished the instant she took his hand again to lead him back to his seat. He drew her to him gently, and kissed her cheek. "You are right, Rosamond," he said. "The one faithful friend to me in my blindness, who never fails, is my wife."
Seeing him look a little saddened, and feeling, with the quick intuition of a woman's affection, that he was thinking of the days when he had enjoyed the blessing of sight, Rosamond returned abruptly, as soon as she saw him seated once more on the ottoman, to the subject of the Myrtle Room.
"Where shall I look next, dear?" she said. "The book-case we have examined. The writing-table we must wait to examine. What else is there that has a cupboard or a drawer in it?" She looked round her in perplexity; then walked away toward the part of the room to which her attention had been last drawn—the part where the fire-place was situated.
"I thought I noticed something here, Lenny, when I passed just now with you," she said, approaching the second recess behind the mantel-piece, corresponding with the recess in which the writing-table stood.
She looked into the place closely, and detected in a corner, darkened by the shadow of the heavy projecting mantel-piece, a narrow, rickety little table, made of the commonest mahogany—the frailest, poorest, least conspicuous piece of furniture in the whole room. She pushed it out contemptuously into the light with her foot. It ran on clumsy old-fashioned casters, and creaked wearily as it moved.