Part 11

There was a somewhat lengthy pause, devoted by Paul to pondering the subject. But of a sudden he looked up to find the girl regarding him beseechingly.

"You--you have not answered yet," she said, timidly reminding him.

"Need I say anything?" he asked, amused at her insistence. "Do you not know me better than to suspect me of doing such a thing? Why, it would not only be an insult to Hugh, but Mrs. Le Mesurier would be quick to see through, and resent, such interference."

Hazel gave vent to a sigh of relief; and Paul went on. "How could you credit such a suspicion for a moment? Don't you see how pleasant it is for me to have some one about that I know and like? Why, that in itself is worth the--the mere salary, let alone the fact that he is really useful. Are you satisfied? Do you believe me?" And he regarded his visitor quizzically.

"Of course," Hazel said generously, and with a little flush. "Between you and me," she continued, "I could not help feeling, from what I know of Hugh, that there might be a certain amount of truth about the char--, in what Uncle Percival said," she amended. "There is no denying that Hugh has not much of a business head, and--and that, therefore, it follows that he cannot be quite as useful to you as you would wish. I--I could not help feeling that the new man you think of engaging could easily do it all, you know. But I quite believe you," she added sincerely, feeling apologetic for harping upon the subject, or, indeed, for adding a single word after having acknowledged herself satisfied; having clinched, so to say, with Paul in faith and trust. "But he would make a splendid artist, would not he?" she said enthusiastically.

"Yes," Paul replied, "he is very clever. It is a thousand pities that he cannot take it up; for, I will admit, he would make a better artist than secretary."

Hazel glowed with gratified pride. "Well," she said, "I must go. Hugh had better not see me. He would, of course, want to know why I had come."

Paul smothered a sigh. "But your feet," he objected. "Are your shoes properly dry?"

"Oh, I think dry enough," she returned. "They will be wet again by the time I am home."

"You will change then, of course?" Paul asked anxiously, and Hazel promised she would.

"By the way," Hazel remarked, "it was my birthday yesterday." They had both risen, and the girl turned her back upon him as she spoke, and stood looking pensively from the window.

"Yes," Paul returned.

"You knew?" Hazel asked.

"Of course," he answered. There was a pause.

"Why didn't you come then? We--they quite missed you."

"I was not asked," Paul explained earnestly. "I thought you might have special plans for the day, and that I might be in the way."

Hazel waited, dissatisfied, for more; but no more, it seemed, was forthcoming.

"You did not even wish me many happy returns of the day," she commented, still turning from him.

"No," Paul admitted, with unwonted and seemingly unnecessary sternness.

"Well," she remarked, not knowing whether to be more hurt or surprised, "I--I think you might."

"You know I wish you everything the world has to give--all good and all blessings," Paul broke out, a marked fervour in his tone, and paused.

"Yes?" Hazel asked, a little breathless, with a sense of being somewhat overpowered.

"As to gifts," Paul went on desperately, "I would come with my arms full--I would lay all I had at----" He broke off, and with an effort seemed to pull himself together.

"You need not make such a lot of it," Hazel expostulated, in innocent surprise. "It is not a twenty-first, or anything so important as that. And even if it were, I should only expect, supposing you wished to give me anything at all, that is, I should only expect one present; just a small remembrance, you know, the--the usual thing."

"There is no usual----" He stopped short and endeavoured to recover himself. "Hazel," he said quietly, "you have not thought the omission due to carelessness, or doubted my--my friendship?"

"Oh no," Hazel declared, "and I did not think of presents: they never entered my head. And as to the wishes--well, you have wished them now, and thank you very much," she added, somewhat hurriedly, half fearful of a repetition of the very full measure, so fervently expressed. "The rain has stopped. I will start at once."

She left her cloak, at Paul's urgent request, to be dried and returned to her later. She stepped out of the French window and, turning, gave her hand to Paul.

"I am so glad I came and cleared it all up--about Hugh," she said warmly. "Good-bye."

"Good-bye," he rejoined, "and many, many happy returns of yesterday," he added, dropping the hand.

Something in his tone puzzled Hazel, and she looked at him wonderingly.

"How odd Paul, that is, Mr. Charteris, is to-day," she mused as she sped across the lawn.

*CHAPTER XIII*

"My dear child," exclaimed Helen Le Mesurier, "what an afternoon to choose for walking!"

Mrs. Le Mesurier was seated in the recess of the sparsely furnished hall, where tea was usually served. She had already partaken of that refreshment, but set about making more at sight of her daughter. Hazel gratefully accepted a cup and seated herself for a chat.

"I have not been for a walk," she said; "at least, I have walked, but not for walking's sake. I have been calling upon Mr. Charteris."

Helen looked surprised, as naturally she might.

"Hazel!" she expostulated. "What purpose could you have had? He comes here so often. Could you not have asked my advice as to going? It looks a little odd--a young girl calling by herself," she added gently. "Paul will think it odd."

She knew her child, and that slight reproof was enough--the least hint that intimated forwardness, in a way, too much; yet both must be given: such was a mother's duty.

The girl's face flushed red, and hastily setting down her cup, she looked at her mother in mute distress.

"Oh, surely not," she pleaded; "surely he thought it perfectly natural--just as I did, mother. I--I wanted to see him very particularly. I could not wait for him to come. If I had waited I might not have had the opportunity of saying what I wanted to say--it was about Hugh."

"You found Hugh there, of course?" Helen interposed comfortingly. "That makes things better. May mothie come into the mystery about Hugh?"

She had made the useful and necessary suggestion of incorrectness in her young daughter's action, and knew that she need say no more upon the subject--that she might with safety pour oil upon the little wound she had perforce inflicted, and bind it up to her child's comfort: for the sensitive girl would not so err again. But the kind words, spoken to bring consolation, brought instead new apprehension to Hazel.

"He was in the house," she admitted: "but he was not----" She broke off, of a sudden recollecting how Paul had proposed Hugh's presence, and how she had forbidden it. "Mr. Charteris wanted to call him and I would not let him. Oh, do you believe he will think me a horrid, bold sort of person?" and she looked beseechingly for her mother's reply.

Helen had difficulty in restraining a smile, as her eyes rested upon her daughter's face: the idea of the possessor of that face being considered a "horrid, bold sort of person" proving almost too ludicrous for the maintenance of gravity: delicate, sensitive, refined, beautiful as a flower; just now tremulous, beseeching.

"No," she admitted, after what was to Hazel an agonised pause, "I don't think he will." And the smile had its way. "But tell me, dearie, why you went at all."

So Hazel told all, beginning at Uncle Percival's uncomfortable and startling suggestion, that Paul Charteris was giving in charity to the Le Mesuriers, through the medium of the "worthless young man"--Hugh. She had before told her mother of the visit to her uncle; and Helen, half amused, half concerned, had not wholly disapproved of her girl's spiritedness; but this portion of the conversation during that visit Hazel had before omitted to report, not wishing to anger her mother against Mr. Desborough, or indeed to disturb her peace of mind until she, Hazel, had first ascertained the truth.

"So you see how I did it all for the best, mother. You see how important it was to learn the truth, and at once, without troubling you, dearest, if I could possibly help it."

"Yes, dearie, I do see. So, I know, does Paul. Do not be troubled about it any more. Only remember that we must, none of us, defy certain conventionalities--we must observe rules by which to regulate our behaviour. They mostly have their good sense and usefulness, though at times we may find them irksome, and tiresome to follow, and feel impatient at their restrictions."

"Yes, mother," rejoined the pretty penitent, meekly.

And then followed one of those close embraces in which mother and daughter were wont to indulge at the termination of every discourse between them, that held in it anything in the nature of reprimand and submission; expressing full, free, and loving forgiveness on the mother's part, and sincere contrition and penitence on the part of the loving daughter.

But the discomforting impression that Hazel had received, that Paul might be thinking her forward, proved disastrous to that young man's peace; for Hazel did her utmost to avoid him, and managed, with most unlooked-for success, to elude meetings--generally slipping away to her own room if he came to the house, and seldom risking discovery by spending much time in her tree; though, had he but known it, one Sunday morning she was holding church there, as was her wont; but she kept so absolutely still, as he passed beneath the branches, the full midsummer leafage of which afforded so complete a screen as to hide entirely any living thing that took refuge there among, be it bird, beast, or--girl, that she was not discovered.

One morning poor Hazel's story was returned, with the editor's compliments and regrets. The girl retired within herself, concerning this great disappointment, until such time as she could confide in Teddie, and receive advice as to her further movements.

Saturday came at last, and a very sober Hazel met the afternoon train, bringing Teddie alone. Gerald, he said, was following by the next.

"And it is just as well, Hazel," the boy added, wearily. "I am nearly off my head with worry. And though, of course, you cannot help a fellow, still you can sympathise with a chap and ease him a bit."

At once Hazel's own troubles became insignificant, and she was all attention; but, as was her custom, she did not press her sympathy upon him in words, but walked on beside him, earnest-faced and ready-witted, waiting for what he should choose to tell her.

"I want five pounds," her brother broke out at length, "and five pounds I must have."

Hazel's heart sank. What a nuisance money was!

"Now the question is how I am to get it," Teddie went on. "Your story will bring in quite that--and you would, I know, lend me the cash. But goodness knows when you will hear of it again. Editors are the dickens for keeping people waiting."

"He did not keep _me_ long," said Hazel, mournfully, and she drew from her pocket the ill-fated manuscript, and Teddie, with incredulous horror in his eyes, read slowly: "The Victoria Cross and How it was Won," twice through before he could believe the evidence of his senses.

"The fellow will never get on," he told Hazel dispassionately. "He will come to no good end. He has not the first essentials for getting on in his particular business. He does not know a good thing when he sees it; he does not know what suits the public taste, and probably cares less. Well, I pity him."

"But his magazine is a very good one, I mean of high standing"--Hazel ventured timidly, thinking Teddie's calm not altogether natural or healthy--"and it is very well known."

"Mere luck," announced Teddie. "It won't last It can't. But I shall go and ask for an explanation," he continued, his anger rising, somewhat to his sister's relief. "He will have to satisfy me."

"He seemed rather nice, if you remember," Hazel observed, in just defence of the roundly abused editor. "That is the worst of it. If he had been, well, a disagreeable sort of man, whom you strongly suspected of being ultra-critical and ill-natured, why, then, one would try again with a light heart. But, Teddie, I cannot help thinking he would have taken it if he could."

"You either forget what I told you of the stories he has accepted, or else you have no faith in my judgment, Hazel," Teddie returned censoriously. "I can assure you he has taken all sorts of trash. I have seen it--in print."

"And you do not think mine trash?" Hazel asked doubtfully.

"No," declared the loyal Teddie, half defiantly, "I don't. And that moonlight scene after the battle, and the battle itself, if it comes to that, are just ripping."

They halted upon the roadway, Teddie to light a cigarette, Hazel to open and unfold the manuscript, to refresh her memory on the parts so highly commended. Together they stood awhile, he reading over her shoulder; but the reconsideration of her work brought the girl no comfort. Even to her youth and inexperience the story appeared crude, obviously the writing of a beginner--and a very young one, of no especial talent. Even her brother began to experience a disquieting sense of imperfection as he read on. Somehow the tale lacked the brilliancy of dramatic force that he had, on first reading, attributed to it; and for the first time he was uneasily conscious of a desire to laugh in quite the wrong places. But he was not going to discourage his sister altogether for all that, though perhaps it would be true kindness to discontinue such unqualified commendation.

"I expect your bad writing put him off," he said at length, with brotherly bluntness. "You ought to have got me or Digby or some one to write it out neatly for you."

"Yes?" questioned Hazel, only half reassured. "Do you think that would have made all the difference, Teddie?"

"It might," Teddie affirmed with, however, less assurance than heretofore. It was, after all, false kindness to give nothing but praise. "But if it is not that, it may be the--the 'vision' they don't like; and you know, Hazel, I am beginning to doubt myself whether it has not got a ludicrous side. Do you think yourself that it is natural? _Would_ the mother be knocking about a battlefield, thousands of miles from home?"

"Perhaps she would not," admitted poor Hazel. "But you see, Teddie, she was supposed to be a widow with no other children, and very, very fond of this only son, whom she follows to the front unbeknown to him, having no home ties to keep her in England."

The girl looked wistfully for her brother's next comment.

"I think," he said decidedly, as they walked on again, "that you have too much killing in your style. I admit that you are good at it, but it may not be liked, especially in a woman writer. It is--it is hard, you might say blood-thirsty. Just look how you kill them off," he continued ruthlessly, waxing eloquent in his theme, "wholesale!"

Hazel looked somewhat shocked as this appalling idea was presented to her.

"Teddie," she gasped, "where--where have I killed them off so? Of course you have to have deaths in battle. It is one of the horrors of war."

"It is not only the battle," Teddie insisted. "It is not only generally, so to speak, but you delight in bringing deaths into private life. Look at your hero's family, for example: how you have to make that wretched woman widowed and childless; excepting, of course, the hero himself, but even him you bring to the point of death. It is not good art," he concluded, shaking his head.

"Yes," she admitted sadly; "perhaps it is a rather unwomanly trait in my writing."

"I am glad you see it," her brother returned, softening somewhat. "Why, you have only got to have a murder in it to make 'Battle, Murder, and Sudden Death' an excellent title."

"Well," Hazel declared, after a pause, "I shall give up trying to make money in that way. My only real gift is music. There is no doubt about it, that I should never make an author. If only people would hire me to sing at little concerts. You know what a success I am at the school concert at Christmas-time, and how old Jonathan Higgins would walk ten miles to hear 'My mother bids me bind my hair,' as I sing it. I am thinking of that five pounds, old fellow," she added dismally.

"Yes, by Jove!" Teddie rejoined, and relapsed into silence. "Since my rise," he began presently, "I have been in constant difficulties. It is always the way. When you have not a halfpenny, you do nothing and go nowhere."

Hazel nodded. She longed to ask her brother to what extent he had broken through this wise regime, but held her peace.

"I date my difficulties from the day when I gave a champagne lunch to five fellows I know."

"The day of the rise?" his sister asked shrewdly, awed by this peep into dissipated life.

"You have got it," Teddie admitted. "It may have been foolish, but the fellows have stood me treat often enough--or offered to--and my usual answer, that I did not go in for society because I could not afford to do my part, did not always work, you know. I got talked over. Since then," he continued, "I have stood a theatre or two, and--well, the long and short of it is, that Mrs. Walters, our landlady, wants her rent, and is beginning to make a nuisance of herself."

Hazel thought of the ten pounds that she had bestowed on her uncle's servant; but, troubled as she was for her brother, she could not repent her of the deed.

"You can't borrow of Hugh or Gerald?" she ventured gently.

"No," Teddie told her. "We have once for all agreed not to borrow from each other, and it is not a bad plan: for though it is dashed hard luck that _I_ am bound down not to borrow of them, I am thankful to think they cannot borrow of me," he added ruefully.

"Yes," Hazel returned, struck with the sense of this, "that certainly is a good thing. Well," she added, "you must let me think it well over. I will do my best, Teddie, to help you."

Already a half-formed plan had arisen in her mind, but she greatly wondered whether she could bring herself to go through with it. Certainly she could not for herself; yet for Teddie it was different--for Teddie she could do much.

Presently they left the roadway, clambered up a high bank, and plunging through a tangle of brambles, entered the cool, leafy walks of their own grounds--a delicious relief after the dust and glare. The foliage was just now at its full, and for the most part of a dark green, each leaf heavy, thick, and strong, with as yet no hint of autumn in its perfection of maturity. Elm, lime, beech, horse-chestnut, oak, copper beech, silver birch, feathery larch, ash, fir, and pine; what an enthralling medley of delight! The great tree branches, heavy to repletion, waved stately in the gentle summer wind, dignified, majestic, all the sportiveness of youth and spring-time gone; rugged-barked, smooth-barked, light grey; green trunks, whitey-grey trunks, almost black trunks; gnarled, veined, moss-grown, creeper-covered; the unspeakable grace of the smaller boughs growing from out the larger limbs: each shapely twig, after a series of knots and delicate articulations, terminating in a leaf of perfect outline, each indentation clearly defined, the edges of some almost fluted in the vigour of their full, crisp growth.

What was there in her beloved woodland that the girl did not know and love; from the swelling, bursting buds of spring--nay, before that, when the bare, brown twigs had nothing to show, save a certain swollen look, and yet seemed instinct with life--to the falling of the leaf? Some leaves there were of such tenacity that only the insistent pushing and shooting of the spring buds could at last succeed in ousting the poor crumpled yellow or brown thing from its place. And oh, the flooring of the woods in autumn; the rustling of one's tread through the fallen leaves of many hues; the crunch of the little triangular beech-nuts, still in their rough, brown, lily-shaped, gaping pods, or fallen out of them, the more ready to hand for the squirrels; the acorns, smiling up green and smooth, half in half out of their dainty brown cup, looking as if a squeeze at the cup's base would cause the slippery nut to shoot out like a benignant green bullet; fir-cones like miniature pineapples cut in cork; spiky pine needles, that only bent in mockery if you tried to prick anything with them; softly bristling chestnut burrs, all agape, discovering the shining red-brown treasure within; and patches of bracken, never far to seek.

In another month's time, Hazel knew, such autumn delights would begin. Just now, nothing could be lovelier than the dense, heavy foliage of full summer; for the shades of green were rich in their many gradations, whilst the grey mosses and woodland grasses gave change in plenty to the eye.

On reaching home, they found a visitor with Helen, in the person of Mr. Charteris. Hardly a visitor, so Hazel thought, in momentary dismay--he seemed to live at Hazelhurst. There was no escaping this time, as hostess and guest were awaiting the two to begin tea, at which her mother liked the girl to preside. Down she sat in their midst, pink-cheeked, and very busily did she occupy herself--tea-making seemed to have become the most soul-absorbing work, calling for her undivided attention.

All this was terribly apparent to poor Paul. It must be himself she was shunning--she was not usually so engrossed, surely, as not to be able to join in the chat, or notice any one, but just steadily fill and refill cups, with stern precision, taxing her memory upon the momentous question of little milk, much milk, one lump, two lumps, no sugar, tea rather weak, tea strong, tea average. "Dear me," thought Paul, "what a lot there is in tea-making if one notices, and I have always thought it so simple."

Presently he asked her if he could help--do something besides handing dishes. She only grew yet pinker-cheeked, refused to look at him--Paul was sure she was aware that he was trying to make her look--and said there was really nothing to do. And she effected her escape as soon as possible, partly, Paul suspected wretchedly, to avoid giving him her hand. And yet, in contrariness, no sooner did she hear him go than she felt inclined to cry, and longed, with a strange inconsistency that puzzled herself, to run after him--to let her hand rest in that strong, dear grasp of his for a few moments, whilst she assured him there was nothing, nothing the matter.

*CHAPTER XIV*

"OSBORNE HOUSE, LANCASTER GATE, "_July_ 12, 19--.

"MY DEAR HELEN,