'Good bye,' she said. 'I am sorry you have had such a hot walk. But why don't you mount here?'
'I like to choose my audience when I exhibit.'
He clasped Wych Hazel's hand after the fashion of the other day; then disappeared one way as she went the other.
Passing swiftly on, holding up her long riding skirt so that it seemed no encumbrance, musing to herself on past events and present expectations; and not without a certain flutter of pleasure and amusement and timidity at the part she had to fill, Wych Hazel reached the low, broad steps and went in.
A slender little person, as airy and independent as the bush she was named for; one of those figures that never by any chance fall into any attitude or take any pose that is not lovely. Hair—as to arrangement—decidedly the worse for the walk; cheeks a little warmed up with the sun, and perhaps other things; grave eyes, where the woman was but beginning to supplant the child; a mouth as sweet as it could be, in all its changes; and a hand and foot that were fabulous. So the mistress of Chickaree went in to receive her first instalment of visitors.
CHAPTER XIV.
HOLDING COURT.
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 flutter of gauzes, a shifting scene of French bonnets, a show of delicately gloved hands, and a general breeze of compliments and gratulations, in those soft and indeterminate tones that stir nothing. Mme. Lasalle it was, with a bevy of ladies, older and younger, among whom it was impossible at first to distinguish one from the other. So similar was in every case the display of French flowers, gloves and embroidery; so accordant the make of every dress and the modulation of every tone. Mme. Lasalle herself was, however, prominent, having a pair of black eyes which once fairly seen were for ever after easily recognizable. Fine eyes, too; bright and merry, which made themselves quite at home in your face in half a minute. She was overflowing with graciousness. Her nephew, the gentleman of the roses, the only cavalier of the party, kept himself in a modest background.
'I have been longing to see you at home, my dear,' said Mme. Lasalle. 'All in good time; but I always am impatient for what I want. And then we have all wanted you; the places of social comfort in the neighbourhood are so few that we cannot afford to have Chickaree shut up. This beautiful old house! I am so delighted to be in it again. But I hope you have met with no accident this morning? You have not?'
'Accident?—O no!'