'I think I must be the paradox myself,' Hazel answered with a half laugh. 'I could do that—I could bear the arrows: I think I could. But you never saw anybody, sir, that liked giving up— anything—less than I do.'
'You would rather bear the arrows than the cords,' said Dr.
Arthur Maryland. 'It is easier.'
'Depends on the people,' said Primrose.
' "As having nothing, and yet possessing all things," ' Dr.
Maryland added rather dreamily.
'I suppose,' said Rollo, with a moment's deep look into Wych
Hazel's eyes, 'the free spirit is beyond bonds.'
'That is it, my boy!' exclaimed Dr. Maryland. 'Think—when Paul and Silas were in the dungeon at Philippi—a dreary place, most likely; and they, beaten and bleeding and sore, stretched and confined in the wooden frame which I suppose left them not one moment's ease,—at midnight it was, they fell to such singing and praising that the other prisoners waked up and listened to hear the song.'
Hazel crossed her slender wrists and sat looking at them, imagining the bonds.
'Do you think it is all in me?' she said, with another sudden appeal to Rollo.
Rollo was not a man fond of wearing his heart upon his sleeve. Another momentary glance went through her eyes, as it were, and was withdrawn, before he gave a short, grave 'yes.' Hazel went back to her musings without another word, and only the least bit of a triumphant curl about the corners of her mouth.
'I wonder how it would feel?' she said, crossing and uncrossing her hands.