Part 32

Gregg felt a sudden relief. The man wasn't drunk--it was the beauty of the picture which had affected him. He could forgive him that, although he felt sure the next move would be an offer to purchase it. He had met his kind before.

"I bought it at private sale," he answered simply.

"When?"

"Yesterday."

"Who sold it to you?"

"Schenck, the auctioneer."

"Will you sell it to me?"

"No; I never sell anything of that kind."

"Not at a large price?"

"Not any price," Gregg replied in a decided tone. It was just as he expected. These men of business gauge everything by their bank accounts. One of them had had the impertinence to ask him to fill up a blank check for the contents of his studio.

"Where did it come from?"

"Schenck told me he didn't know. It was held for storage. It seems to interest you?" There was a slight tone of resentment in Gregg's voice.

"Yes, it does, more than I can tell you, more than you can understand." His voice had lost its nervousness now.

"It reminds you of some one, perhaps?" asked Gregg. There might, after all, be some spark of sentiment in the young man.

"Yes, it does," he continued, devouring it with his eyes. "I haven't seen it since I was a child."

"You know it, then!" It was Gregg's turn to be surprised. "Where did you see it, may I ask?"

"Down in Maryland, at Derwood Manor, before it was burned."

The blood mounted to Gregg's cheeks and he was about to speak. Then he checked himself. He did not want to know of the portrait's vicissitudes. That it was now where he could be locked up with it, made up for everything it had come through.

"Yes, these memories are very curious," remarked Gregg in a more gentle tone. "It reminds me also of some one I once knew. Don't you think it is very beautiful?"

"Beautiful! Beautiful! It's the most beautiful thing in the world to me! Why, it's my own mother, Mr. Gregg!"

"You--your own mother! What's your name?"

"Philip Colton."

VII

The same poise that restrained Adam Gregg when he came suddenly upon Olivia's portrait in the auction-room sustained him when he looked into the eyes of the young man whom, years before, he had left as a child at Derwood Manor.

"Are you sure?" he asked. He knew he was--he only wanted some fresh light on the dark record. For years the book had been sealed.

"Am I sure? Why it used to be in the garret till my father died, and then my mother brought it down into her room. I have seen her sit before it for hours--she loved it. And once I found her kissing it. Strange, isn't it, how a woman will regret her youth?--and yet I always thought my mother beautiful even when her hair turned gray."

Gregg turned his head and tightened his fingers. For an instant he feared his tears would unman him.

"If it is your mother's portrait," he said, "the picture belongs to you, not to me. I bought it because it recalled a face I once knew, and for its beauty. A man has but one mother, and if your own was like this one she must be your most precious memory. I did not intend to part with it, but I'll give it to you."