'I shall ask your father,' said Hazel, decidedly. 'He always thinks I ought to know everything at once.'
'Oh, Hazel, my dear, how can you say so?' cried Prim. 'Indeed, papa is never so unreasonable. And there he is this minute, and you can ask him.'
The long windows of the room looked upon a stretch of greensward spotted with trees. Coming across this bit of the grounds, Dr. Maryland and Rollo saw one of the windows open, and caught sight also of the party within. Even as Dr. Maryland's daughter spoke, they stepped upon the piazza and came into the room.
'That is a picture of the loss of all things,' Dr. Arthur was saying. 'How would you be able to understand?' But then he stepped back, and left the explanation in other hands.
' "The loss of all things!" ' Hazel repeated, bewildered. 'How do you do, Mr. Rollo?—Dr. Maryland, there is always some special reason why I am especially glad to see you!'
'What is the reason now, my dear?' said the doctor, with a very benign look on his face.
'These two people,' said Wych Hazel, with an airy gesture of her head towards her other guests, 'find me in a puzzle and push me further in. And I want to be pulled out.'
'In what direction shall I pull?' asked the doctor.
'Well, sir,—O Mr. Rollo, don't you want the cat?—I know you like cats,' said Hazel, 'and she is in my way.—It is only about my old picture here, Dr. Maryland, which they pretend to understand. Dr. Arthur says it means "the loss of all things,"—and that does not clear up my ideas in the least. Why must I "wait" to know what it means?' she added, linking her hands on the Doctor's arm, and raising her eager, vivid face to his. 'Prim says I "don't know much"—but I do not see why that should hinder my learning more.'
How strong the contrast with the martyr's face! how high and still and calm the look of him who had overcome! How tender, how open to sorrow, how susceptible of loss, that of the girl on whom as yet the rough winds had not blown! Dr. Arthur's eyes went soberly from one to the other. Rollo had taken the little cat from its position on its mistress's shoulder, and now stood with it established on his own, quietly and somewhat gravely attending to what was going on.