The carriage door opened; he had no time to reply.
CHAPTER XXXII.
SUPPER.
It was not exactly a cheery evening in Hazel's deserted rooms. Rollo had the entertainment of Prim and Mrs. Coles upon his hands, and was besides all the time busied in baffling her efforts to find out whether he was anxious, whether he knew where Wych Hazel had gone, whether he was aware of what kept her, and whether he did not think something ought to be done. This sort of exercise grows wearisome in time; and Rollo finally gave it up and fled. He put on coat and hat and repaired to the great entrance of the hotel, which seemed to him just then if not a point of rest, yet to be nearest to that point. Here he had a view of the storm, which he studied at leisure in the intervals of watching everything on wheels that went by. He knew who it was, when Hazel's carriage drew up at last, and was by the side if it before it had fairly stopped.
He opened the door and took Hazel out, and led her into the house, without paying attention to anything but her. He took her up stairs to her own room, which he reached without going through the parlour where Mrs. Coles and Prim were. There he threw off his own snow-covered wrappings and then hers, that he might wrap her in his arms. He did not say what he had been feeling, but his manner of great gladness left Hazel to infer several things. And for a minute or two she was passive, shewing a pale, tired face. But then there swept over her such a sense of what she had, and of what she had escaped, that she could only lay her head down on his shoulder and be still; a shiver running over her as she remembered other souls adrift.
'Have you dined, in the snow, anywhere?' were Rollo's first coherent words. He was not given to talking sentiment. At the same time he was gathering Hazel's cold hands into his.
'I could not help it, Olaf!' Hazel broke out. 'I have been whirled about like a brown snow-flake.'
'And come home frozen.' He rang the bell for Phoebe, admonished her to be quick, and went back to the drawing room. When Hazel a few minutes later followed him, she found a servant bringing in supper. Primrose gave her a welcome kiss, but the other lady exclaimed,eyes and senses on the alert,
'Well, my dear! we have been uneasy about you.'
'Nobody ever needabout me,' said Wych Hazel. 'Unless there is something afoot more serious than a snow-storm.'