"Thank you," she returned, "Mr. Charteris will like to come in, I know. We came to see little Bobbie, and I wanted to give you a pinafore for him, that I have made all myself, after Mrs. Doidge had cut it out."
Bobbie himself, present, but invisible behind his mother's back, was now dragged forward.
"For shame!" Mrs. Boutcher exclaimed, gently shaking him. "Don't you know the young lady what saved you from the very jaws? Say ''Ow do you do?' this moment, and none of your nonsense. He'll understand some day what an obligation he is a-labouring under to you, miss," Mrs. Boutcher hastened to explain apologetically. "At present he is no more grateful nor what he would 'ave been if you'd just let him be."
Hazel had been to see her protégé twice before to-day, and found the constant references to what Mrs. Boutcher termed her "'eroism" somewhat embarrassing. Nevertheless, the good woman's conversation caused her much diversion. One singularity of hers was never to mention death by name, though the meaning of the dread word was conveyed to her audience frequently, in all manner of ingeniously wrapped up and elegantly expressed phrases.
Paul came in, and Mrs. Boutcher, with ready hospitality, dusted a second chair and asked him to be seated.
"And if I might make you a cup of tea after your drive, I'm sure I should be honoured," she assured her guests.
She proceeded to bustle about, on hospitality intent, whilst Hazel lost no time in coaxing Bobbie to come to her and try on his new pinafore. She had a way of her own with children. She did not appear to notice the small individual himself, but seemed deeply interested in the toy he held, and begged to look at it more nearly. The boy drew nearer, lost his shyness little by little, and was soon exhibiting his treasure and expounding its many virtues to an apparently absorbed auditor.
"It is wonderful," Hazel commented. "I have something in this parcel besides the pinafore. Come and sit on my knee and see if you can untie the string."
Presently the child was seated in Hazel's lap, contentedly eating chocolates. He was a pretty, fair-haired, blue-eyed boy, and Hazel felt real affection for the little fellow. Beside her innate love of children, she felt a proprietary interest in Bobbie, whose life she had undoubtedly saved. Mrs. Boutcher regarded the pair with admiration and maternal pride, her head on one side, a steaming kettle in her hand, poised for discharging.
"Look at that, now!" she exclaimed, turning to Paul for sympathy, "and him so shy as he'll run away when the minister shows his face at the door, as if it was the bogeyman's." She approached Paul and lowered her voice. "You'd never guess, not to look at him," she said confidentially, "as it's but three months ago as he was rescued from out the Valley of the Shadow. Dear me," she continued, shaking her head, "yes, it was a mercy—not vouchsafed to all of us neither. There was Mrs. Jones's now—she's moved since, and it's no wonder—her little boy fell into the water, just as it might be my Bobbie, and he crossed the River," she whispered hoarsely.