Wych Hazel

When one has in charge a treasure which one values greatly, and which, if once made known one is pretty sure to lose, I suppose the impulse of most men would be towards a hiding...

'The most potent of reasons!' said Mr. Falkirk. 'The rather, because while professing to have no root, it hath yet a dozen. How long ago did Jack show his lantern, my dear?'

'And the hat ribbands match,' said Wych Hazel, 'and the gloves. And the veil is a shade lighter. Everything matches everything, and everything matches me. You never saw my match...

'Dinner--and the rest of it,' translated Miss Hazel. 'Will it be needful to make a grand toilette, sir? or shall I go to the table as I am? If one may judge of the selectness of...

There was mist everywhere. On the winding bed of the river, lying piled like a gray eider-down coverlet; folding itself over the forest trees; floating up to the Mountain House,...

'Then I can tell you, sir. We take the "owl" stage day after to-morrow morning,--and we tell _nobody_ of our intention.' And Wych Hazel's finger made an impressive little dent i...

To Chickaree by the stage was a two-days' journey. The first day presented nothing remarkable. Rollo was their only fellow traveller whom they knew; and he did nothing to lighte...

The place was a dell in the woods, the bottom filled with a dark, clear little lake. At the lower end of it stood the mill; picturesque enough under the trees, with its great do...

With the departure of the more stirring member of the company, Miss Wych had subsided; and in that state could feel that she was tired. She sat in the doorway of the mill. It wa...

Rollo had driven the rockaway down and was going to drive back. He put Wych Hazel into the carriage, recommending to her to lean back in the corner and go to sleep. Phoebe was g...

The birds were taken by surprise next morning. Long before Mr. Falkirk was up, before the house was fairly astir with servants, there was a new voice in their concert; one almos...

They went up a low staircase and along a gallery to Primrose's room. Large and low, as nice as wax, and as plain. How unlike any room at Chickaree, Wych Hazel could not help fee...

Morning has come, and the Queen of Chickaree must return to hold her court. Little guesses the Queen what a court is gathering for her. While she is quietly eating her breakfast...

She was scarcely within the door when Mr. Falkirk met her, put her arm within his and led her into the drawing-room. For a few minutes there the impression was merely of a flutt...

'Yes, sir. Pony carriages, I believe, generally do. I am not well enough known in the neighbourhood yet to expect other means of setting my wheels in motion. But if I have nothi...

Several people were on the steps before the door, watching and waiting for them. The house shewed large and stately; the flight of steps imposing. Hot-house plants stood around...

Mr. Falkirk was sitting with the paper in the tea-room at Chickaree. A good lamplight gave him every temptation to lose himself in its manifold pages, but somehow the temptation...

'Miss Wych--my dear--all in brown?' said Mrs. Bywank doubtfully, as her young charge was arraying herself one morning for the woodcraft. Some rain and some matters of business h...

He could see how the shock struck her, but she made no exclamation, only her hands met in a tight clasp as they had done in the woods' fire. She faced him silently, waiting more...

Wych Hazel stood alone on her broad steps, watching the others out of sight, and feeling alone, too. It must be nice to belong to somebody,--to have brothers and friends! Just f...

After the day of rain, and the afternoon of clearing wind and clouds, the evening of Mrs. Merrick's party passed into one of those strange, unearthly nights when the whole world...

Just glancing round at her companion to make sure that he followed, taking off her hat as she went, Hazel passed swiftly into the cottage and into Mr. Falkirk's study, to the fo...

Nothing but the most superb propriety was to be expected at Mrs. Powder's; nevertheless Wych Hazel went escorted by Prim and Rollo in Dr; Maryland's rockaway. Dr. Maryland himse...

'And how do you like your new neighbour, Prim?' said the young Dr. Maryland the first night of his return home. He had talked all tea-time to the collective family without once...

nothing like Dr. Maryland's benign regard, or Mr. Falkirk's watchful one. Those eyes went down into hers with a sort of grave taking possession, or holding it; something more th...

There come, sometimes, in certain lives, certain days and weeks which seem to be all adrift and beyond legislation. The people who might exercise control cannot; and the people...

When, however, a little later, that young lady came forth to her carriage, attended as usual by a retinue of servitors, a single figure was standing by her carriage door. He sto...

Mr. Falkirk was not disturbed that night with being told anything. But when the sun had risen fair and clear over the green world of Chickaree, and Gotham moved silently about t...

Mrs. Bywank, inspecting her breakfast table from time to time, certainly had Mr. Rollo's wish in her heart, even though it got no further. And setting on orange marmalade for hi...

'I suppose there is no good reason to be assigned against that,' said Mr. Falkirk, rather growingly, and after a pause. It sounded a little as if he would have liked it if the f...

That night, and the next morning, Miss Kennedy had a fight with herself, trying hard to regain her footing, which was constantly swept away again by some new incoming tide of th...

A great new sorrow is a many-cornered thing; having its sharp points that sting, and its jagged points that wound; with others so dull and heavy and immoveable that one is ready...

It was between eight and nine o'clock one evening, two or three days later, when Mr. Rollo was informed that some one wanted to speak to him. It was Reo Hartshorne.

It happened that invitations were out for a croquet party at Chickaree; and the day of the party was appointed the third succeeding these events. Thither of course al the best o...

Yes, it was very hard for her; much harder than any one knew but herself. The joke was too striking to be passed by, even in the case of an ordinary person; but when it was Miss...

The very night after this affair of the ticket, came a 'German,' pure and simple, at one of the far-off houses of the neighbourhood. The daughters here were of Miss Fisher's per...

The fancy ball at Moscheloo was a brilliant affair. More brilliant perhaps than in the crush and mixed confusion of city society could have been achieved. It is a great thing to...

Hazel was accompanied to her carriage of course, as usual. But when she was shut in, she heard an unwelcome voice saying to the coachman, 'Drive slowly, Reo; the night is very d...

It was no new thing for the young lady of Chickaree to come home late, and dismiss her attendants, and put herself to bed; neither was it uncommon for her to sleep over breakfas...

As she came to the side door, she saw Rollo just dismounting from Jeannie Deans, and immediately preparing to remove his saddle and substitute the side-saddle; which he did with...

So Jeannie Deans went back into the stable, and carried her light burden no more for some time. But Hazel did not go to Beacon Hill, in any fashion nor on any day; and it is to...

This visit and talk gave Hazel a great deal to ponder. The work, and--the doer of it; and--did he ever think of her, she questioned, in the doing? And did he expect to make _her...

It seemed to Hazel, that in these days there was no end to the thinking she had to do; and if Mr. Rollo had only known, she remarked to herself, he need not have been at the tro...