me a great, warm heart,——like Dan’s.Well, it was getting on in the evening, when the latch lifted, and in ran Faith. She twisted my ear-rings out of her hair, exclaiming,——“O Georgie, are you busy? Can’t you pierce my ears now?”
“Pierce them yourself, Faith.”
“Well, pierce, then. But I can’t,——you know I can’t. Won’t you now, Georgie?” And she tossed the ear-rings into my lap.
“Why, Faith,” said I, “how’d you contrive to wear these, if your ears aren’t——”
“O, I tied them on. Come now, Georgie!”
So I got the ball of yarn and the darning-needle.
“O, not such a big one!” cried she.
“Perhaps you’d like a cambric needle,” said I.
“I don’t want a winch,” she pouted.
“Well, here’s a smaller one. Now kneel down.”
“Yes, but you wait a moment, till I screw up my courage.”
“No need. You can talk, and I’ll take you unawares.”
So Faith knelt down, and I got all ready.
“And what shall I talk about?” said she. “About Aunt Rhody, or Mr. Gabriel, or——I’ll tell you the queerest thing, Georgie! Going on now?”
“Do be quiet, Faith, and not keep your head flirting about so!”——for she’d started up to speak. Then she composed herself once more.
“What was I saying? O, about that! Yes, Georgie, the queerest thing! You see this evening, when Dan was out, I was sitting talking with Mr. Gabriel, and he was wondering how I came to be dropped down here, so I told him all about it. And he was so interested that I went and showed him the things I had on when Dan found me,——you know they’ve been kept real nice. And he took them, and looked them over close, admiring them, and——and——admiring me,——and finally he started, and then held the frock to the light, and then lifted a little plait, and in the under side of the belt lining there was a name very finely wrought,——Virginie des Violets; and he looked at all the others, and in some hidden corner of every one was the initials of the same name,——V. des V.
‘That should be your name, Mrs. Devereux,’ says he.
‘O, no!’ says I. ‘My name’s Faith.’
Well, on that he asked, was there no more; and so I took off the little chain that I’ve always worn and showed it to him, and he asked if there was a face in it, in what we thought was a coin, you know; and I said, O, it didn’t open; and he turned it over and over, and finally something snapped, and there was a face,—here, you shall see it, Georgie.”
And Faith drew it from her bosom, and opened and held it before me; for I’d sat with my needle poised, and forgetting to strike. And there was the face indeed, a sad, serious face, dark and sweet, yet the image of Faith, and with the same mouth,—that so lovely in a woman becomes weak in a man,—and on the other side there were a few threads of hair, with the same darkness and fineness as Faith’s hair, and under them a little picture chased in the 

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