Page:Alice Stuyvesant - The Vanity Box.djvu/172

 "It seems very probable to me, that if they are anxious to find Mr. Barr, they are looking for him now, and wouldn't wait to try and get at him through you. They would know that you would be very careful—in case, I mean, that there were any reason why he didn't wish to be found."

"There might be reasons which weren't bad ones at all," said Nora, quickly. "Ian is not a coward. I won't let you believe that. He is the bravest and strongest man I ever knew. Look" (with nervous fingers she unfastened two or three buttons of her muslin blouse, and pulled out an open-faced locket, on a thin gold chain)—"that's his portrait. Don't you think he seems worthy of all the love and all the sacrifices a girl could make?"

She held out the locket, and Terry took it in her hand. She had thought a good deal about Ian Barr and his story, trying to call up a picture of the young man and now she looked at his photograph with great interest. Somehow she felt pleased to find that he was not unlike what she had imagined him to be.

He was evidently very dark, with black hair which would have been inclined to curl, had he not kept it cut very short. Black, clearly marked brows were drawn straight and low over the large dark eyes, which, even in the photograph, seemed passionate and full of fire like those of a Spaniard. The face was clean shaven; the nose fine and aquiline, not unlike Sir Ian