'Dear,' she said, in that same wistful way, laying her hand on the girl's shoulder, 'does he love you?'
Hazel started in extreme surprise; looking up with wide-open eyes; and more pale than red in her first astonishment.
'He? me?—No!' she said, as the blood came surging back. But then recollections came too, and possibilities—and eyes and head both drooped. And with the inevitable instinct of truth the girl added, under her breath—
'Perhaps—how do I know? I cannot tell!'
By that time head and hands too were on the back of her chair, and she had turned from Gyda, and her face was out of sight. With a tender little smile, which she could not see, the old Norse woman stood beside her, and with tender fingers which she did feel, smoothed and stroked the hair on each side of her head. For a few minutes.
'And, dear,' she said presently, in the same soft way, 'do you love him?'
There are questions, confusing enough when merely propounded by ourselves, in the solitude of our hearts; but which when coming first from the lips of another, before they have been fairly recognized as questions, become simply unbearable. Hazel shrank away from the words, gentle as they were, with one of her quick gestures.
'I do not know,' she cried. 'I have never thought! I have no business to know!'
And lifting her head for a moment, with eyes all grave and troubled and almost tearful, she looked into the face of the old Norwegian, mutely beseeching her to be merciful, and not push her advantage any further.
'I know!' said Gyda, softly. 'But it's only me.' And as if recognizing a bond which Wych Hazel did not, she lifted one little white hand in her two brown ones and kissed it.