d undergrowth at the entrance to the glade. I wondered I had not
seen it before, but it was the first time I had entered the glade since
Anthony Cardew had been there.

I picked up the shining thing with great eagerness and found it to be a
miniature set about with brilliants. My foot struck against something
which proved to be a leather case in which the miniature, no doubt, had
lain. As it fell the case must have opened, and that was a lucky thing,
for if the miniature had remained in the case it might have lain there
till the day of judgment. It was the mere accident of the stones
sparkling that had caught my eye.

I stood with the miniature in my hand and stared at it, and it began to
dawn upon me why Anthony Cardew had thought me a ghost. The face was
far, far more beautiful than mine could ever be, yet it was strangely
like the face that looked at me from the glass every morning when I did
my hair.

To be sure, mine, I thought, was a poor simple, common face beside the
face in the miniature with its wonderful expression. I have heard my
grandmother say that the fair beauties of the South are the most
beautiful of all, as beautiful as they are rare; and the original of the
miniature had an opulent, golden beauty which we of the cold North
could never attain. Perhaps the beauty might even have been over-opulent
if sorrow and sadness had not given the face an air like a crowned
martyr in heaven. So sweet it was, so gentle, so full of spiritual
light, that I felt I could worship the owner of such a face.

Then I noticed the grand-ducal crown in diamonds at the top of the
miniature, and it came to me that this was the portrait of the lady
Anthony Cardew had served with a passionate devotion. No wonder I felt
aflame for her, although I was only a girl; and I thought that so Mary
Stuart must have looked to have left love of her alive in the world to
this day.

I thought of how much the loss must have meant to Anthony Cardew, and
cast wildly about in my mind for any means of letting him know that it
was safe. But I could find none; and I could only hope that presently I
should learn his whereabouts. I put the miniature into my breast for
greater safety, and felt it warm there, as though a heart had been alive
in it.

CHAPTER XV

THE EMPTY HOUSE

We had rooms on the sunny side of St. Stephen's Green, not far from the
Shelbourne Hotel and the Clubs, and, what interested me more, the
Grafton Street shops.