The Gold of Chickaree Part 11

'It is becoming necessary for me to make so many statements,' said Rollo, 'that I am getting puzzled. I am very sorry for Mr. Falkirk.

What sort of a talk did you give him?'

'Mr. Falkirk was so uncommonly glad to see me, that I should have been all sugar and cream if he had not beset me with business. As it was, I am afraid I?wasn't.'

'Not my business?'

'Your business? The mills?'

'_Our_ business, then.'

'Hus.h.!.+?No! I have not got any,' said Hazel, whose spirits and daring were beginning to stir just a little bit once more, though she felt a little frightened at herself when the words were out. 'Mr.

Falkirk wanted to know my sovereign pleasure about retaking the house we had last winter.'

'I am very sorry for Mr. Falkirk!' Rollo repeated gravely. 'Do you think?by and by, when we have been married a year or two, and he is accustomed to it,?we could get him to come and make home with us!'

Hazel looked at him for a second, as if he took her breath away; but then she looked at nothing else?or did not see it, which came to the same thing,?for some time. Dingee appeared with baskets and bouquets, after the old fas.h.i.+on, which had grown to be an established one at Chickaree; and his mistress looked at them and ordered them away, and read the cards, and did not know what names she read. But in all the a.s.sortment of beauties there was never a rose one bit sweeter or fresher than the face that bent down over them.

CHAPTER VIII.

ACORNS AND ACORN-CUPS.

One afternoon, a day or two later, Rollo had begged for a walk in the woods; proposing that they should 'begin to get acquainted with each other.' The trees were beginning to shew crimson and gold and brown and purple, and the October light wove all hues into one regal drapery of nature, not richer than it was harmonious.

The warm air was spicy; pines and hemlocks gave out resinous sweetness, and ferns and lichens and mosses and other wild things lent their wild wood flavour. It was rare in the Chickaree woods that day. Fallen leaves rustled under foot, squirrels chattered in the branches, partridges whirred away. Down through the shadow and the light they went, those two, talking irregularly of all sorts of things. Rollo was skilled in all wild wood lore and very fond of it.

He could talk deliciously on this theme, and he did; telling Wych Hazel about trees and woodwork and hunter's sports and experiences, and then of lichens and the rocks they grew on.

Into the depths of the ravine they plunged, and then over a ridge into another; away from paths and roads and the possibility of wheels and riders. Then Rollo found a mossy dry bank where Wych Hazel might sit down and rest, with her back against the stem of a red oak. He roved about gathering acorns under the wide spreading boughs of the tree, and finally came and threw himself down at her feet.

'This is pleasant,' he said, looking along the brown slope, brown with mosses and fallen leaves, on which the wonderful light came so richly and so tenderly. 'This is pleasant! Is the sense of possession a strong one with you?'

'I love my woods?dearly! I never had much else?that was my own?to care about.'

'I believe it is strong in me. I can enjoy other people's things?but I think I like them better when they are my own. I fancy it is a man's weakness.'

'What did you mean by "beginning to get acquainted?" ' said Hazel, from under the protecting shadow of her broad hat, and with her mind so full of unanswered questions that it seemed as if some of them must come out, even if they did get her into difficulties. 'I thought you _thought_ you knew me pretty thoroughly.'

He rolled himself over on the bank, so that he could look up at her comfortably, and answered laughing,

'What did you think about me?'

'O I knew about you,' said Hazel.

'How long ago?'

'Different things at different times. Mr. Rollo,'?with a little blush and hesitation,?'will you tell me how you knew the size of my finger?'

'Let me look at it.' And he took the little hand, tried the ring up and down the finger, kissed it, and finally let it go.

'It fits?' was all his remark.

If _that_ is the way you are always ready to help me!?Hazel thought. But as no such idea could venture out, and as the next question that stood ready was altogether too much "in line," a squirrel up in the tree had it all to himself for a few minutes. Rollo waited for the next question to come, but as it tarried he remarked quietly,

'You may remember, I had a glove of yours in my possession.'

'_You_. Where did you get it?'

'I picked it up. I have often done that for ladies' gloves;?but I never kept one before.'

'You picked it up?' Hazel repeated slowly. 'I _never_ lose my gloves.

And you are not one of those silly people who steal them. Where did you pick it up, Mr. Rollo?'

A sort of shadow crossed his face, as he answered, 'One night?in the woods?where it was a mere little point of light in the gloom.'

'O!' she said eagerly, looking up,?'did you? that night? I remember. And you kept it. _Then_, Mr. Rollo??' The soft, surprised intonation of the last three words left them anything but incoherent.

'Well??' said he smiling.

'I wish I had known you had it. That glove gave me a great deal of trouble.'

'Why?'

'I was so much afraid it had got into the wrong hands. But when was _this_ done?' she said, eyes and words going back to the ring again. 'Not since?the other day?'

'Hardly! No. It was done last winter.' And Rollo's eyes flashed and laughed at her, a kind of soft lightning. Hazel laughed the least bit too, in return; but then her head went down as low as it gracefully could, and under the shadow of her broad hat she questioned.?

Had she betrayed herself _then_, to him? What has she said? what had she done, that night? Her face rested on her hand in the very att.i.tude of perplexity.

'Come,' said Rollo, 'you are finding out a good deal about me that you did not know before. You had better go on.'

'Did you buy up the whole Hollow?' said Hazel abruptly. 'All the way from the mills up to Gyda's?Mrs. Boerresen's?cottage?'

'No,' said Rollo, with a somewhat surprised recognition of the change of subjects; 'not yet. I have obtained possession only of the mills which were held by Morton himself. Those are the two cotton mills, and one of the woollen mills, which had lately reverted to him from the closing of the lease term and the inability of the former lessee to make any agreement for a new one. Further down the Hollow below me, lie the woollen mills of Paul Charteris.'

'And there is nothing above you yet, but the water and the land?'

'No. Nor like to be. The head of the valley is owned by Gov.

Powder; and he has neither means nor inclination to do anything with it. It would be better for me to own it, though. Why, Hazel?'?with a smile.

'Why had you better own it?'

'I want to get control of the whole Hollow as fast as I can; and then, I want to keep the control.'

'Well, but why _don't_ you then?' said Hazel. 'What is the use of waiting?'

'I am not ready to build more mills yet. And there are other reasons, Hazel. Mr. Falkirk thinks I am jeopardizing my money. I do not think so, nor intend it. I believe in the long run I shall prosper. But for the present, and for awhile, I shall be at a disadvantage, it may be; because I am paying larger wages and receiving less profits than my neighbours, and I must keep capital free to bear me and my workmen out through the time of trial?if it is to come. I mean never to have so much capital embarked in the mills, that I should have nothing to carry my hands and myself through a dead calm. You see?' Rollo continued with again a smile,?'being a careful navigator, I mean to carry the wind in my pocket.'

Hazel followed his words with attentive eyes as well as ears, and then went off into a brown study, with her chin on her hand.

'Well,' said Rollo, 'what is all this catechism for?'