Part 5

"I don't want to seem conceited," Hazel broke in upon the conversation. She was seated near her mother on a low stool, chin in hand, deeply interested in all that passed. "I don't want to seem conceited," she said modestly, "but I can't help thinking that you had better have _me_. One often hears of lady secretaries," she went on, in expostulation at the smile upon her mother's face, a smile that Paul's countenance reflected; "it would be delightful, and you would not mind how I dressed, would you?" she added, turning eagerly to Paul. "You would let me have my hair down, and let me wear what I liked, provided I came punctually at the hours you named, and did the work properly."

Paul looked upon the ground. It was difficult to keep the muscles about his mouth under control. Helen was about to speak when Hazel resumed: for it appeared to her that Paul was considering the matter.

"I dare say you would be rather cross with me sometimes, at first," she admitted, "and think my writing queer and untidy; but I should soon fall into your ways, and my writing is at least legible. I have more of a business head than Hugh," she added, after a pause. "You see, I am not hampered by a love of drawing."

Mrs. Le Mesurier had acquainted her guest with Hugh's difficulties of temperament.

The girl awaited a decision breathlessly, but it was Helen who first spoke, the while Paul contemplated the little brown business head, with its wonderful, drooping hair, in silent and varied emotions.

"It would not do, Hazel," she said quietly. "Neither Paul nor myself would like it, nor think it wise."

Hazel glanced quickly at Paul, only to see him confirm her mother's words by a smiling shake of the head.

"Very well, motherling," she said resignedly, "and, after all, it would be selfish in me not to let Hugh have the trial," she added, more brightly.

Nevertheless, the girl looked down at the two small hands in her lap, and sighed.

*CHAPTER V*

The next day, Sunday, Hugh, Gerald, and Teddie, the two latter in high and unrelenting collars, well smoothed as to hair, attired in well-brushed clothes and boots of an almost supernatural polish--for Miles, the faithful, had personally attended their toilet--soberly and with elaborate care helped each the other over the boundary fence, intent upon returning, with prompt courtesy, the call their mother had received from Paul Charteris. The three wished to create a favourable impression upon their whilom friend, and a "decent get-up," to use Hugh's own words, was of the utmost importance for producing this desired result. Hugh, who had affected a low collar and loose tie, would have been well satisfied with himself were it not for the annoying circumstance that his new shoes pinched horribly, and that they squeaked, being somewhat low down in the scale of gentlemen's shoes, and bent on blatantly announcing the fact.

"Confound the things," he said angrily, trying various modes of locomotion, and finally adopting a mincing step of airy lightness, which seemed somewhat to pacify his fretful footgear, albeit he was pinched no whit less severely.

"Confoundedly hot in these high collars," Teddie grumbled, as he unfolded a snowy handkerchief and dabbed his moist brow. Immediately there was wafted upon the air the scent of lavender.

Hugh and Gerald regarded their brother in some severity, not unmixed with envy, in that they had neglected to make this elegant addition to their own toilets. "By Jove, Teddie," Gerald expostulated, "you must have literally soused that handkerchief."

"It is a bit damp," Teddie acknowledged composedly, "Comes in very refreshing."

Pursuing the winding paths in as direct a line as the topographical possibilities of the wood admitted, they at length came upon a large lawn that skirted the trees and lay smooth and green before the shady verandah of the south side of the house. Several long, low cane chairs stood invitingly about the verandah, and upon one of these, stretched at full length, in utter and complete comfort, was Paul Charteris, in loose white flannel garb, a cigar between his lips, a novel in his hand.

He sprang to his feet with an exclamation of welcome as Gerald, Hugh, and Teddie made their appearance across the lawn.

"Now, you fellows, just make yourselves comfortable and cool off," Paul said in amused compassion, as he marked the heated condition of the trio, and his quick glance took stock of the unsuitability of their habiliments. "I will look up Jackson, and ask for something to drink."

Hugh, glad to avail himself of the invitation, mincingly mounted the steps, and sank gratefully into the easiest chair, the other two likewise seating themselves.

Paul, disappearing for a few moments, quickly returned, followed by a servant bearing a tray, containing various sparkling liquids in multifarious bottles. Over this good and cooling cheer conversation soon became easy and natural, Teddie becoming so much himself as to refer energetically to stand-up collars as a "rotten invention."

"Look here, Charteris," he said, "perhaps, as you are alone, you won't mind my taking it off for a bit," and he proceeded to unfasten the offending piece of starched linen, in accordance with his host's warmly expressed advice, while Hugh surreptitiously slipped his poor tortured toes from their natural quarters into the main body of the shoe.

"You don't object to a pipe, Charteris?" Gerald inquired, producing from his pocket a well-worn briar-root, and, on Paul's assurance that he often enjoyed one himself, Hugh and Teddie quickly produced two others for his edification.

"Hazel received an invitation last night to spend a week with the Travers," Gerald announced conversationally, when all four were luxuriously smoking. "She is rather bothered about it; she does not care to leave the mater for so long."

"She could cut the visit short," Paul said, not unwilling to suggest so pleasing a solution of the difficulty. "How--er--how would your sister go?" he added, prefiguring himself and Hazel taking the long drive together in his dogcart, through the beautiful countryside.

But Gerald's reply quickly extinguished any such day-dream. "Oh, young Travers would fetch her in the trap; that is easy enough," he said carelessly.

"Is that Digby?" Paul asked quickly.

"Yes," Gerald replied, "he is desperately gone on Hazel--makes an awful idiot of himself."

"How old is he?" Paul asked curtly.

"About two- or three-and-twenty," Teddie broke in. "He is a decent fellow enough if only he would not sing."

Paul's innate delicacy would not permit him to ask that which he longed to know: whether or not that brown-eyed child, Hazel, reciprocated the feeling of the importunate Travers. However, Hugh soon relieved him on that score.

"Of course, Hazel does not guess what he is up to," he said, somewhat scornfully, in no wise trying to hide his contempt of the laboriously arranged and clumsily carried out tactics of young Travers. "How should she? None of us are likely to open her eyes. He only succeeds in boring her fearfully; she keeps out of his way whenever she can."

Paul was conscious of a sudden interest, almost amounting to a liking, for the luckless young man. "What sort of a fellow is he to look at?" he asked, readjusting his tie with some complacency.

"Oh, well enough," Hugh returned, to which somewhat vague description Paul's other guests grunted agreement.

"Greeky," Hugh went on, for his host's better understanding, and the subject was dropped, this graphic portraiture being deemed so eminently exhaustive that Charteris must be criticising a vivid mental picture of young Travers, the while he reclined with half-closed eyes, puffing lazily at his cigar.

"By the way," Paul began presently, turning to Hugh, "has Mrs. Le Mesurier spoken to you of the idea we formed?--just a suggestion, you know; you must, of course, feel at perfect liberty to--er----"

"Yes, thanks, awfully," Hugh replied suavely. "I'll turn up to-morrow. Nine o'clock suit--nine to four?"

For a moment Paul was staggered by such prompt acceptance of the post and subsequent arrangement of detail. "I think ten would suit me better," he said, a trifle apologetic. "I like to go in for various modes of exercise for a couple of hours before beginning work."

"All the same to me," Hugh returned airily. "Ten to five, then?"

"What do you say to having no fixed hour for leaving?" Paul suggested. "Just turn up at ten every day, and we can see what work there is to do, and do it. You will as often as not get through in an hour or two."

"That will just suit me," Hugh declared frankly. "And the salary?"

"Well," Paul said, with hesitancy, "a hundred a year would--er----"

"Phew," whistled Teddie, resorting to his bescented handkerchief; "and to think how I have to slave for a miserable forty!"

"But then, look how distasteful any kind of clerical work is to me," Hugh said ingenuously, gently expostulating with the unreasonable Teddie. "Even one hour is very real hard work to me; whereas Gerald, here, positively likes such business. If you look at things in their right proportions, you will find that I could hardly be overpaid, whatever you gave me."

Teddie did not look convinced by his brother's argument, and Paul, half amused, half dismayed at the outspoken candour of his secretary-elect, could not but determine that, whatever it was that filled the fair, curly head, diplomacy did not number among the gifts of Hugh Le Mesurier.

When, after some further talk, the young men rose to take their leave, Paul insisted upon accompanying his guests on at least part of their homeward way. Friendly relations were now so far established between the houses of Earnscleugh and Hazelhurst, that Teddie strolled with easy grace across the lawn, carrying the obnoxious collar in his hand, ever and anon waving it airily in gesticulation in the course of his conversation with Paul and Gerald; whilst Hugh modestly brought up the rear, stepping gingerly in bright red socks, bearing around his neck the plaintive shoes, slung together by their laces.

Hazel, meanwhile, who had walked with her brothers to the verge of the estate, had settled herself cosily upon the carpet of moss with a book, to await their return. Curiously enough, a desire to accompany them never entered the girl's mind, though it had ever been her habit to join her brothers in their excursions. Vivian Charteris had been well accustomed to the sight of Hazel's little figure among the tall and lanky forms of the Le Mesurier boys. Indeed, he would have sorely missed the bright and gentle girl, whom he had known intimately from babyhood, and for whom he entertained a brother's regard. He had gloried in the Le Mesurier lungs--more especially when voiced by the silvery tones of his little, brown-eyed favourite--echoing through his domain or about his house. But Vivian was Vivian, the grave and serious student, sixteen or seventeen years older than herself. Now, a quite unconscious reticence seemed to withhold the girl, to forbid the old childish freedom. Paul was almost a stranger to her: for, during the earliest years of her childhood, he had only spent at Earnscleugh the brief holidays of the long school-terms. At the age of eighteen he had entered upon his college career, visiting either his home or travelling abroad in the vacations; finally quitting England when Hazel had attained to her tenth year. So that, while familiar with his name, of the actual Paul the girl knew little.

Hazel sprang to her feet as her quick ear caught the sounds of footsteps approaching from the direction of Earnscleugh. Perching herself upon the fence, she peered eagerly down the little, twisting, shady pathway that she well knew led most directly to the house, presently perceiving Teddie's loose and angular form, looking somewhat neglige about the neck, while his collar encircled the crown of his straw hat. Gerald next made his appearance round the bend, the narrow ways being of necessity traversed in Indian-file order.

"Was Charteris at home?" Hazel called, with all the vaunted strength of the Le Mesurier lungs, poised upon the topmost rung, balancing her lithe body, hands on hip.

"He is here," Teddie called back, and, too late, Hazel discovered the figure of Paul, following close upon Gerald, whilst Hugh still brought up the rear in besocked feet.

Hazel precipitately dismounted from her lofty stand, her sensitive little face growing pale with dismay at what she deemed her unmannerly way of dispensing with the formality of the usual prefix of "Mr.," which, however, Paul thoroughly understood: not as a rude peculiarity in the girl herself--little aristocrat that she was to her finger-tips--but as natural in the circumstance of that girl possessing five brothers.

There was the bare possibility in Hazel's mind that her words had not caught Paul's ear, or, being audible to him, that the omission had not been remarked. With this faint hope to buoy her, she held out her hand to meet Paul's over the fence, the while with flushed countenance she lifted her eyes, half shy, half anxious, and endeavoured to read the handsome face the merry eyes, that seemed laughingly to defy her scrutiny, whether consciously or unconsciously she could not determine.

As a matter of fact Paul was perfectly aware of her embarrassment and its cause, and was much amused. He was bent upon keeping her in a state of uncertainty, however, and merely commented upon the beauty of the day, which mischievous spirit was hardly in accordance with the young man's usual attitude towards her.

With a demure response Hazel moved a little away, soon becoming interested in a cluster of flowers at her feet, Shepherd's Eye, that seemed to gaze up at her in blue wonder and sympathy. She proceeded to pluck the small, starlike blossoms, her brothers and Paul meanwhile sitting upon or leaning against the mossgrown boundary fence, in several and varied poses of ease and comfort, engaging languidly in such broken and disjointed conversation as befitted the heat of the noonday.

"What is the name of that little flower?" Paul's voice broke in upon Hazel's musing. He had followed her unawares, and made as if to take one tiny blue star from her bunch.

But Hazel pressed upon him the whole miniature posy, in frank generosity.

"Take them all," she said. "Are they not sweet? They are called Shepherd's Eye--they grow mostly over there, in the meadow."

"Shepherd's Eye!" Paul said, gratefully accepting the gift. "But here are red ones, exactly like the blue."

"I call them Sad Shepherd's Eye," she returned. "They are eyes that must have been weeping bitterly for hours. I only care for the happy, blue ones."

"They are prettiest, certainly," Paul rejoined; "but I should like one or two of the red ones, to remind me of your pretty fancy. Let me gather them; you will make yourself hot and tired."

But Hazel disclaimed all fatigue, and was presently tying together some of the tiny red blossoms with a wisp of tough grass.

"When are you two coming?" Gerald called. "I say, Charteris, come along home to lunch. The mater will be glad to see you."

Paul looked at Hazel. "May I?" he asked diffidently. "Mrs. Le Mesurier may----."

"Mother says that the house is always open to you," the girl replied in her gracious little way.

Having completed her task, she gave the flowers into Paul's eager keeping, and proceeded to lead the way through the shady tracks of Hazelhurst wood, her brothers affecting to breathe again as they safely went by the great oak-tree with Hazel still in their midst; albeit she had cast a lingering look up into its leafy shade, in passing.

As the significance of the long-drawn sighs caught Hazel's understanding, she faced them swiftly, and still keeping step with the four, danced along backwards, the better to explain away their groundless fears.

Paul thought he had never seen anything so pretty.

"I never climb trees when I am wearing my white dress," she said remonstrantly. "It is the one thing that makes Mrs. Doidge really cross. She says it takes Mattie two hours, every time, to get it up." And Hazel looked down at her simple muslin frock with some pride, in that it should prove to be so important a factor in the weekly routine of domestic labour. Having duly impressed her hearers, the girl faced about and continued the unbroken march in silence, with pretty, swinging motion, all her own.

Presently the booming of a gong came to them on the still air.

"By the way," Gerald said, of a sudden oppressed with his quick transition from guest to host, "you will forgive any shortcomings in the meal, won't you, Charteris? It is of no use attempting to disguise the fact that we are living--well, extremely simply, just now."

"You will be all right, Charteris," Teddie chimed in comfortably. "You are fed by old Miles on roast mutton and rice pudding with such a tremendous amount of ceremony that you are quite deceived into thinking you are in for a royal feast. And, after all, you can always eat up your own dainties when you get back to your place."

"Talking of Miles's impressive ways," Hugh said presently, "the mater had to speak to him once--he was actually serving cabbage round as a separate course, as if it were asparagus or artichokes. Oh, and by the way," he added, "I should advise you not to accept the coloured fluid he offers. No one knows what it is."

Thus warned at all points, the guest was ushered into the presence of Mrs. Le Mesurier. The party soon adjourned to the dining-room, where the fare, if simple, was most excellently cooked and daintily served, and Paul found the refined simplicity very much to his taste, vowing within himself that, with all his wealth, he would for the future practise such simplicity himself: in truth, he was inclined to think the thing could not be overdone. The trouble would be to make his housekeeper and butler view the case in like light--people of their class thought so much of pomp and show. Oh, well, let them be, but he would have his own way when entertaining company.

He did not recall Hugh's caution with regard to the wine--whether to the butler's dismay or gratification would be hard to conjecture. Certain it was that the guest was the observed of Miles, with no small amount of interest furtively bestowed, and some palpable apprehension, as he first sipped the beverage.

Something in the flavour of the vintage rendered Paul reflective, or mayhap brought to mind Hugh's words. For a few moments his countenance was somewhat blank of expression, then, with a slight gasp, he heroically raised the glass to his lips and drained its contents. The next minute the old serving-man was beside him, eager, tremulous, with the fateful decanter poised for discharging.

Paul's fortitude gave way. "No more, thank you, Miles," he murmured hurriedly. "I must not take more than one glass," he added confidentially, eyeing the decanter with solemn conviction; "that is a full-bodied wine."

"Yes, sir," returned the delighted Miles, "and between you and me, sir, it is not what you would call an expensive wine, either. My mistress has better in the cellar, but I had not time to get it up," he murmured in pseudo-apology, for he deemed the vintage good enough as a luncheon beverage for any gentleman, old or young.

Paul nodded response, and asked for water.

The meal proceeded merrily enough when the boys had ceased to choke over the incident of the wine. Happily they were eating fish, so that Miles was in blissful ignorance as to the real cause of their unwonted distress, sternly rebuking his fellow-servants for the careless way in which the food had been prepared as he sat, half an hour later, at his own dinner in the servants' hall.

*CHAPTER VI*

After luncheon the party adjourned to the woods, Helen promising the young people that she would join them later, and suggesting that tea should be served in the open air at four o'clock.

The Le Mesurier boys composed themselves to rest during the heat of the early afternoon, and ranged themselves each according to his idea of comfort. They chose the spot where Hazel was wont to hold her court of feathery and furry subjects; for, while the trees were sufficiently thick to afford a bountiful shade, there was a commodity of space in which to stretch long limbs, besides the pleasing circumstance that the carpet of last year's leaves was soft and springy, whilst the spicy odour of fir-cones and pine-needles proved grateful to the nostril and conducive to slumber.

Paul Charteris felt no desire to follow their example; probably Hazel would settle herself at too great a distance, and become lost in her book. Neither did he wish to close his eyes, for the real was even more charming than the imaginary Hazel. So, marking that she, too, seemed in no wise disposed for idleness--for she was flitting hither and thither among the trees in restless but evident enjoyment, plucking a flower, cooing to a wood-pigeon, extricating with deft tenderness two creeping plants one from the other, giving to each a fresh start in its race upon the tree-trunk to which they clung--he begged to be taken to the old oak-tree, the wood-nymph's home, to have its many beauties expounded to him. Accordingly the two, unnoticed by the napping Le Mesurier boys, set forth at so goodly a pace that at length Paul cried out in remonstrance, fearful lest such business-like locomotion should see them back to the starting-point within the space of a few minutes.

"Are you so hot?" Hazel asked pitifully. "How thoughtless of me! But I am quite cool--feel," and, craning her slender neck towards him, she tilted her head, that he might the more readily touch her soft cheek and thereby prove the truth of her assertion.

And Paul, nothing loth, delicately stroked the pink cheek once down to the pretty chin; nor durst he linger in the delicious contact, for the girl's spontaneity, bespeaking as it did liking for and trust in himself, however unconsciously bestowed, was as sweet as it was precious to the young man, and woe be to him if word or action of his should startle her voluntary friendship, should cause her to shrink within herself, away from him. Unspeakable happiness might one day be his, if he possessed his soul in patience, and fostered the pretty trust that might daily, all unknowingly, draw nearer, cling closer, till time should ripen friendship into a sweet consciousness, and he might pluck the beauteous flower and wear it for all eternity within his breast. In the meantime he would gratefully, thankfully, sun himself in her esteem.

"Beautifully cool," he murmured slowly. "But do not blame yourself," he went on. "I am not uncomfortably warm--only--it is rather a nice little walk--that is to say, I do not often have you to myself; I don't want to get back too soon."

"You find it companionable, just we two by ourselves," Hazel said ingenuously, by way of making explanation to the young man of his own hardly comprehended reasons for enjoyment.

"Yes," Paul said demurely, "I find it companionable."

"Thank you," Hazel returned politely. "I like it, too; though I am never happier than when I have all the five boys roaming about with me," she added, with blunt but perfect truth. "I suppose you don't remember much of Cecil and Guy?"

"I remember them perfectly," Paul averred. "Is it long since you saw them?"

"We have not seen Cecil for years--India is so far," she answered with a little sigh; "but Guy comes to Hazelhurst now and again for a day or two, once in two months or so. He is due now," she continued, "overdue--not having been here for nine weeks. It would be very convenient if he came just now--for money, you know. He always gives me money--generally two or three pounds--once as many as five. You see," she added, "I shall be obliged to spend that eightpence to-morrow."