"MY DEAR HELEN,
"It may not be news to tell you that I am a lonely old man; but how lonely and, for the matter of that, how old, I am but now beginning to realise. The realisation came upon me with the visit of that girl of yours—Hazel, she said her name was; rather an absurdly fanciful name, by the way: but there, I won't carp, and it suits the child. I confess to you that she has taken me by storm; I have tried to fight against such feelings, called myself a sentimental old fool, in my second childhood, which is probably the right explanation; but however that may be, the feeling remains. She came into this dreary house like a breath of country, this Hazel of yours, and set me thinking of woods, nuts, berries, and flowers. Spirited, too: gave as good as she got from the old man. The long and short of it is: will you allow the child to stay with me for a short while? I know I have no claim upon you, no right to ask favours—I never for a moment imagined it possible that I should ever ask a favour. That I have, and no small one, I grant, is in itself an apology for the past—a holding out of the olive-branch and all the rest of it. Don't keep me waiting long for your answer. As I said before, I am a sentimental old fool, in my dotage, and I am lonely, or I should never have brought myself to the pitch of courage necessary for writing to you—of risking the probable humiliation of being denied what I ask—which, I admit, is all I deserve at your hands.
"However you may decide concerning my request, let there be peace between us for the girl's sake, and for the sake of old times. Let me once again have the privilege of signing myself
"Your affectionate uncle,
"PERCIVAL DESBOROUGH."
"HAZELHURST, BERKS,
"July 13, 19—.
"MY DEAR UNCLE,
"It was with mingled pleasure and pain that I read your letter. I know full well you are lonely. In my girlhood I can remember you as a kindly, sociable man—sociable in a domestic sense: I cannot remember that you ever cared for society. And it is unlikely that one should so change in one's later years as to be happy and content, with doors barred against one's nearest kin; living on alone, entertaining hard thoughts and, dear uncle, let me say unjust thoughts, of those of whom one was once fond. I gladly take the extended olive-branch.
"Do not think me ungenerous, if I say that I cannot make up my mind to allow Hazel to stay with you. She is my only daughter, and your house, devoid as it is of women-folk, is not the place I should choose for a young girl. May I suggest that she should come to spend a day with you, and, need I say, dear uncle, how pleased I should be if you would visit us here, if you could bring yourself to put up with our plain faring and simple ways?