ance exhibited marks of the utmost
perturbation. "Your picture!" she exclaimed; "you lost it! How? Where?
Did you know that person? What has become of him?"

"I knew him well," said I. "That picture was executed by himself. He
gave it to me with his own hands; and, till the moment I unfortunately
lost it, it was my dear and perpetual companion."

"Good heaven!" she exclaimed, with increasing vehemence; "where did you
meet with him? What has become of him? Is he dead, or alive?"

These appearances sufficiently showed me that Clavering and this lady
were connected by some ties of tenderness. I answered that he was dead;
that my mother and myself were his attendants and nurses, and that this
portrait was his legacy to me.

This intelligence melted her into tears, and it was some time before she
recovered strength enough to resume the conversation. She then inquired,
"When and where was it that he died? How did you lose this portrait? It
was found wrapped in some coarse clothes, lying in a stall in the
market-house, on Saturday evening. Two negro women, servants of one of
my friends, strolling through the market, found it and brought it to
their mistress, who, recognising the portrait, sent it to me. To whom
did that bundle belong? Was it yours?"

These questions reminded me of the painful predicament in which I now
stood. I had promised Welbeck to conceal from every one my former
condition; but to explain in what manner this bundle was lost, and how
my intercourse with Clavering had taken place, was to violate this
promise. It was possible, perhaps, to escape the confession of the truth
by equivocation. Falsehoods were easily invented, and might lead her far
away from my true condition; but I was wholly unused to equivocation.
Never yet had a lie polluted my lips. I was not weak enough to be
ashamed of my origin. This lady had an interest in the fate of
Clavering, and might justly claim all the information which I was able
to impart. Yet to forget the compact which I had so lately made, and an
adherence to which might possibly be in the highest degree beneficial to
me and to Welbeck; I was willing to adhere to it, provided falsehood
could be avoided.

These thoughts rendered me silent. The pain of my embarrassment amounted
almost to agony. I felt the keenest regret at my own precipitation in
claiming the picture. Its value to me was altogether imaginary. The
affection which this lady had borne the original, whatever