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Janet went on talking as she placed a chair for the visitor, and went forward to the rude little desk where Joyce kept her treasures. She talked on, finding a relief in it, a necessity for exertion. Mrs. Hayward looked round the little homely place, meanwhile, with a curiosity which was almost painful. It was a tiny little room with a sloping roof, furnished in the simplest way, though a white counterpane on the little bed, and the white covering of the little dressing-table in the window, gave an air of care and daintiness amid the simple surroundings. A few photographs of pictures were pinned against the wall. But the place of honour was given to two photographic groups framed, one representing a group of school children, the other a band of (Mrs. Hayward thought) very uncouth and clumsy young men. Janet, with a wave of her hand towards these, said— ‘Hersel’ and her lassies,’ and ‘Andrew and some of his freends.’ It seemed to the keen but agitated observer, in the formality of the heavy cluster of faces, as if all were equally commonplace and uninteresting. She sat down and watched, with an impatience which nothing but long practice could have kept within bounds, while Janet opened the desk which stood against the wall, and then a drawer in it, out of which at last, with trembling hands, she brought a little parcel, wrapped in a white handkerchief. Janet was as reluctant as her visitor was eager. She would fain have deferred the test, or put it aside altogether. Why had she kept these papers for her own undoing? She undid the handkerchief slowly. There fell out of it as she unfolded it several small articles, each done up in a little separate packet. ‘A’ her bit things that she had,’ Janet explained. ‘A locket round her neck, and a bit little watch that winna go, and the chain to it, and twa rings. I wanted Joyce to wear them, but she will wear nothing o’ the kind, no’ so much as a bit brooch. Maybe you will ken the rings if you see them,’ said Janet, always anxious to postpone the final question, putting down the larger packet, and picking up with shaking fingers, which dropped them two or three times before they were finally secured, the tiny parcel in which the ornaments were enclosed.