IN THE ROCKAWAY.
When, however, a little later, that young lady came forth to
her carriage, attended as usual by a retinue of servitors, a
single figure was standing by her carriage door. He stood
aside to let the devotees put Wych Hazel into the little
rockaway which was her sole present equipage; but when the
last words had been said and the last man stepped back, Rollo
stood at the door before Dingee had time to shut it.
'Will you give me a seat as far as Mr. Falkirk's?' he said,
looking in.
Now when you have not seen a person for six weeks or so, a
request for a seat in your carriage is not generally the
opening remark, and Wych Hazel paused in a sort of
astonishment. Then another thing made her hesitate.
'If you will answer it to Mr. Falkirk,' she said. 'You know I
am forbidden to give any one a seat in my carriage. Have you a
special permit, Mr. Rollo?'
'I never ask for what I cannot have,' he said, jumping in. And
then he offered her his hand. 'How do you do?'
'Very well. I should think that must make you an adept in
Prim's beloved art of waiting,' said Wych Haze.
'If the lesson must be learnt, I would rather wait before
asking. After that, I believe I do not know how to practise
it. How do you feel about waiting for your horses?'
'Feeling is dead, and impatience is all tired out with hard
work and want of sympathy. So it is pretty quiet just now.'
'Want of sympathy?' he said, inquiringly.
'Yes. I used to fume about it a little, but Mr. Falkirk only
said "My dear," and a few other things of a cooing nature.'
'I believe I have brought you what you will like.'
'O, have you?' said the girl, with her musical intonations,
and a degree of eagerness which spoke impatience in fair
condition. 'You are very good to take so much trouble, Mr.
Rollo! But I am more glad than you can imagine.'
'Then I am very glad,' said he. 'Will you trust me to drive
you the rest of the way, if I displace Mr. Gotham? I share
your infirmity of impatience sometimes.'
'An infirmity, you call it?--Well, displace anybody you like,
but me,' said Wych Hazel, arranging herself in a small luxury
of fatigue against the not too luxurious back of the rockaway.
Her companion was silent a few minutes until the carriage
passed out from the Moscheloo grounds and had gone a few rods;
then he tapped Mr. Falkirk's factotum on the shoulder.
'Mr. Gotham,' said he, in tones of pleasant authority, 'I
can't stand anybody's driving but my own to-night. Stop, if
you please. You and Dingee may take a place with my man; my
trap is just behind. Tell him to keep close and follow.'
'Sorry to do h'anything that looks un'ansome, sir,' said
Gotham, swallowing his surprise with the adroitness of long
practice, 'but I 'ave Miss 'Azel in charge, sir.'
'You _had_, my friend. I will relieve you. Come, jump out, and
don't keep your young lady waiting.' The voice was of calm
authority which most people understand and obey. And Wych
Hazel laughed.
'I'm sure I can't say what Mr. Falkirk will think, sir!' said
Gotham, in a displeased voice. ' 'Owever--I will h'assume it's
h'all right, sir.--Though why he couldn't drive his h'own team,
if he'd such an 'ankering for the ribbands,' he muttered to
Dingee as he got down, 'I'm sure is a perplexity.'
'Wanted to drive Missee Hazel,' said Dingee, climbing like a
cat into the other conveyance, and proceeding to drive Mr.
Rollo's man nearly out of his wits. 'You never does sound de
gen'lman, Mas' Gotham. Telled you so long ago.'
Having got his wish, Mr. Rollo drove regularly enough for a
mile or two; till all carriages going their way had passed
before or dropped behind or turned off, and they had the road
entirely to themselves. The moon was riding high, and though
an old moon, gave enough light to make driving a thing of no
difficulty. Thus far Rollo had driven in comparative silence,
with only a word or two occasionally to Wych Hazel. He had not
removed himself by any means out of her companionship, but
throwing himself sideways on the front seat of the carriage,
looked sometimes out and sometimes in. Now, when the road was
their own, and the old horse could find his way along with
very little guiding, and the moonlight seemed to illuminate
nothing so much as the stillness, Rollo turned his head and
spoke.
'Miss Kennedy, do you like to have people come suing to you
with petitions?'
'I think I might--if I could answer them myself,' she said,
thinking of some that had been preferred that night. 'But when
my yes or no depends on somebody else, it is rather stupid.
One tires of a perpetual referee at one's back.'
'This depends on nobody but you. But I am rushing into the
middle of things,' said Rollo, giving the old steed an
intimation that he need not absolutely fall back upon walking.
'Miss Kennedy, I am coming to you with a great petition to-
night--and I am too impatient to wait for it.'
'Mr. Rollo with a petition!' said Wych Hazel. 'And impatient!
Well--then why _does_ he wait?'
His voice told well enough why he waited, at least in part;
the earnestness of it was so blended with not a little anxiety
and not a little tenderness. He spoke slowly.
'Miss Hazel,' he said, 'you have neither father nor mother nor
brother nor sister. I am almost as much alone in the world.
May I speak to you as one who knows what it means?'
' "It?"--being alone?' she said.
'Just that. Having no one near enough to care or dear enough
to dare, what would be for your happiness. As it is so with
you, and I know it, may I for once step into the gap, without
being too severely punished by you for my venturing?'
'Why I thought you always ventured,--everything!' she said,
stirring up now in her surprise.
'Then shall I make my petition? I never dared so much in my
life as I am daring now.'
'Of course you may make it,' said Wych Hazel. 'As fast as you
like. I shall begin to be impatient too.'
'If you choose to question me for my reasons, I will have the
honour to give them. Or if you ask what right I have to move
in the matter, I will answer that, too.'
'Beforehand?'
'Certainly. If you wish.'
'No matter,' she said, with a slight laugh which was yet a
little disturbed. What was looming up behind this barricade of
preliminaries? 'I thought you based your right just now-- But
never mind. Go on, please.'
He was silent nevertheless a minute, while the old horse came
to an unchallenged slow walk. Then Rollo ungloved his right
hand and held it out.
'I cannot see your face,' said he. 'Give me your hand, so that
I may know, while I hold it, that you are not displeased.'
'Why, Mr. Rollo?' said Hazel, with the same half laugh, 'you
are very--extraordinary! It strikes me your one petition covers
a good many. Must I take the glove off?--if you are to be
indulged.'
'There!' said he, taking her hand in the same warm firm grasp
she had known before. 'I am going to ask you to promise me
something--that it will not be pleasant to promise. Miss
Hazel'--speaking low and slowly--'do not dance round dances any
more!'
The tone was low, also it was very earnest and very grave.
'What?' she said, in a sort of but half comprehending way.
'Why not? what is the matter with them? I am hardly the least
bit tired.'
'You don't know!' he said, with a slight pressure of the hand
he held. 'You don't know. This is why not, Miss Hazel--that I
would not see my sister in them. Do you understand?'
'O yes,' she answered. 'I have seen people before who did not
like dancing,--two or three, perhaps. But there is always
somebody to dislike everything, I think. You do not enjoy it
yourself, Mr. Rollo,--and so you do not know.'
'I have danced twenty dances where you have danced one. I know
what they are made of. You only know how they look.'
'Hardly that,' said Wych Hazel. 'I know a little how they
feel. I have never had an outside view, I believe.'
'Can you do me the great honour to take my view,--and my word
for it?'
'If you liked flying to music as well as I do, you would take
mine,' she said. 'Air is better than earth, when you can get
it.'
'Do you think I would wish to interfere with your pleasure, or
presume to interfere with your actions, without reasons so
strong that I can hardly express their significance? Believe
me, if you knew these round dances as well as I know them, you
would never be mixed up in one of them any more.'
'Mixed up?' said Wych Hazel. 'Do you suppose I do all the wild
things some people do, Mr. Rollo?'
'No,' he said; but he left his plea standing.
'Well then what is the matter? If ever you hear of my
"exchanging hospitalities," I will give you leave for a
lecture a mile long.'
'Your eyes are innocent eyes and do not see. Can you not trust
me far enough to act upon my knowledge, and distrust yours?'
'But trusting you does not make me distrust myself,' she said.
'And even Prim confessed to me once that you do occasionally
make mistakes.'
'I do not in this,' said he, very gravely. 'Yet there is no
particular reason why you should believe me. Miss Kennedy--you
cannot continue this pastime, and keep yourself.'
'What do you mean?' she said quickly.
'You cannot remain just what you are.'
'Mr. Falkirk thinks there is room for improvement,' said Wych
Hazel, with some coldness; 'but your words seem to point the
other way. Perhaps you will be kind enough to tell me at once
all that you think it needful I should hear in the connexion.'
'You need not take that tone,' he said; 'but perhaps I _must_
displease you. Miss Kennedy, I have always thought of you as
one who would never permit a liberty to be taken with her.'
'I am happy that we agree for once,' she said, with a lift of
the eyebrows and a voice to match. 'It is precisely the way in
which I have always thought of myself.'
'Follow that out!' said he half laughing, and at the same time
clasping a little closer the hand he held.
'Well--I have followed it out all my life. I never do, Mr.
Rollo.'
'Not knowingly. But-- How shall I tell you!' said he, in a sort
of despair. And the old horse found it was necessary for him
to move on.
'It must be said!' he broke out again, 'and there is no one
but me to do it. Miss Hazel, you allowed liberties to be taken
with you to-night.'
The little hand he was holding shrank perceptibly. Not
twitching itself away, but as it were withdrawing itself into
itself, and away from him. Otherwise she sat absolutely still.
'Unconsciously,' he went on. 'You did not know it. The
pleasure of the play kept you from knowing what it implied.'
'_Allowed_, did you say?'
'Look back and think,' said he, calmly.
'As if they could, without my knowing it!' she exclaimed. 'As
if they would!'--
'Look back and think,' he said.
'Well,' said Wych Hazel, 'look back and think! And I find the
most extreme deference, and--nothing else that touches the
question.'
He drew a sort of short, impatient sigh, and waited a moment.
Then leaned over towards her again and spoke slowly.
'Six weeks ago,' he said, 'two little hands would not come
near enough to my shoulder to take the kitten from it. And I
loved them for the distance they kept.'
The girl drew suddenly back, freeing her hand now with a
swiftness that told of a deep hurt somewhere. For a moment she
did not speak--then only a breathless--
'Well?'
'Is that displeasure?' he said.
'When have I shortened the distance?' But the words were
defiant with pain, not anger. And Rollo on his part remained
perfectly still and perfectly silent, not even seeming to know
how the old horse was going to please himself.
Nothing could have been more still, outwardly, than the white-
robed figure in the corner,--and nothing need be more inwardly
tumultuous.
'If it was an open wagon,' she thought to herself, 'I should
jump out--over the back or somewhere!' O this having men talk
to one! And what was he talking about? and what had she done?--
she who had done nothing! Except--'dance better than ever
anybody danced before!' 'For the distance they kept'--and when
did not her hands keep their distance from every one! How many
times that very evening had she been voted 'cruel,' for
refusing some favour which other girls granted freely? Mr.
Rollo, too!--who had praised her 'womanliness'--But with that
the womanish element prevailed, and there came a quiver of
lip, and for an instant her hands were folded across her eyes.
Then down again, to hold each other in order.
And yet her hand had been on twenty shoulders that evening,
and twenty arms had encircled her!
There was an interval of some length.
'Miss Hazel,' said Rollo at length, and his voice was clear
and manly, 'have I offended you?'
'No,'--under her breath. 'I--suppose not.'
'Do you want me to give, if I can, some justification of
myself?'
'There is none. Except that you did not mean to say what you
said.'
'I meant no justification of my words,' said he, gently but
steadily. 'If you want _that_, it is, that they were spoken to
save you from harm.'
'Ah!' she said with a half cry,--then checked herself. 'What
else does Mr. Rollo wish to justify?'
'Only my right to speak them;--if you did, as you might,--
question it.' He paused a little, and went on. 'I can give you
only half of my plea, but half will do. It is, that your
father and mother dearly loved mine.'
It was all Hazel could do to bear her mother's name just then.
Her hands took a sudden grip of each other, but no answer
came. Not for some time: then words low and softly spoken--
'I think I asked for no plea, Mr. Rollo.'
'Then if you are content with it,' said he, in a lighter tone,
'give me your hand once more, only for a moment this time.'
She hesitated--then held it out. He bent down and gave it a
swift, earnest kiss; after which he turned his attention to
his driving duties, for some time neglected, till Mr.
Falkirk's cottage was gained. As he took Wych Hazel out of the
carriage, he said,
'It's so late, if you don't forbid me, I am going up to my old
friend, Mrs. Bywank, to ask her to give me lodging to-night.'
Hazel bowed her head in token that he might do as he pleased,
giving no other reply. But it is safe to say that, by this
time, ideas and thoughts and feelings and pain, and--'other
things,' as she would have phrased it, were so inextricably
mixed up in the girl's head, that she hardly knew which was
which and which was not. She walked steadily in,--then gave
about two springs to her brown corner room, and locked the
door.