"If _I_ don"t see, as I said, I"ll not go."
"But how could it, you contradictory man?"
"Human nature often needs relaxation and recreation," said Dane.
"Mine might."
"Relaxation!" said Mrs. Coles. "When you know as well as I do, that you are a pine knot for endurance, and a very burr for persistence."
"Don"t take her statements, Hazel," said Dane. "She does not know much about the vegetable creation, if she does about me."
"But answer me, if you can."
"Human nature also needs cultivation, I was going to add. A servant must make himself the best servant he can. A man is bound to give himself and his family the utmost of every kind of cultivation that is possible to him without neglecting higher ends."
"H"m. And is Mrs. Rollo"s travelling clock? Which cla.s.s does that come under?"
"Pleasure."
"O you hold pleasure lawful then?"
"Certainly. Within the above limits."
"Prue, Prue," said Prim uneasily. "Stop. You have gone far enough; and too far."
"I was seeking knowledge, Prim; and that, Dane says, is commendable. May I ask one other question, Dane? What head do these mean little picture frames come under?"
"You do not like them?" said Dane, surveying the one in hand with its enclosed photograph of Dannecker"s Ariadne.
"Why don"t you have handsomer ones?"
"Economy."
"You cannot mean it."
"Nevertheless?it is true."
"You, who have such loads of money? ?"
"To use, as I told you," said Dane, smiling now. "The engravings and photographs are both pleasure and education. I do not find either the one or the other in gilded stucco."
"Well, have them carved, then."
"Can"t afford it, as I said."
"But my dear Dane! are you going to regulate your whole household on such principles?"
Dane answered with the most matter-of-fact manner, that it was his intention.
"But I should think elegant frames would come under the head of pleasure."
"They would not, to me, when I thought of the money they cost."
"But Dane! with your means! Do you know what people will say of you?"
"I know," he answered. "The world will always find a nice name for a fellow that does not go by its rules."
"You are so obstinate!" said the lady. "You always were. Nothing _I_ could say would ever move you. I shall get Arthur to talk to you.
But what does your wife think of your doings?"
Dane was silent, only the corner of his mouth began to play.
"She has stockings on this minute that cost five dollars a pair, if they cost a penny. How does that fit with your wooden picture frames?"
Dane rose and rang the bell. "You must be tired, Prudentia," he said without the change of a muscle. "And Prim is, I know. I shall send you to bed to get a good night"s sleep, for you have a great deal to do to-morrow."
Mrs. Coles did not know how to answer. And the servant appearing, Rollo ordered candles, and himself went with the ladies to the door of their room. There he took leave of Prim, whose face had clouded painfully, with a whispered word which brought a flush of pleasure back to it. It was not yet late. The little travelling clock was only ringing its ten musical silver peals, as Dane came back into the room. Wych Hazel was still standing as the ladies had left her, looking absently down at the picture frame. Dane came silently up and stood beside her.
"Do you think I shall ever stop being perverse?" she said abruptly.
"How are you perverse now?" he asked in a very disengaged tone.
"I have been pretty nearly as perverse as I could be, all these two days!" said Wych Hazel. "Fighting everybody and everything. I dressed just as much as good taste would let me, because I never can put your friend down in a plain dress. And I have answered five hundred questions.?And I never thought about stockings in that way.?I thought one must have stockings!?" said Hazel, putting out her dainty foot and looking down at it ruefully. But then the brown eyes came eagerly back to him. "Do you think I shall, Olaf?" she repeated.
Gently, very fondly, he gathered her into his arms and held her close. And without saying a word, his manner gave a.s.surance of contentment enough to satisfy any woman.
"Then you are not going to scold me?" he asked at length, without releasing her.
"For what?"
"Bringing you into such perverse circ.u.mstances."
Hazel looked at him wistfully. "I knew how it would be," she said. "I knew myself. That was why I said no. At least, partly why."
"Do you regret my action?"
"I was naughty enough yesterday morning to hope you would," said Hazel with a confessing laugh.
"I told Prim just now, privately, that if we ever went that journey I spoke of, she should go too."
The colour flushed up into Hazel"s face, and went away again, but she gave neither word nor look.
"You are sorry?"
"Never ask such questions afterwards!" said Hazel. And she would have disengaged herself, but he would not let her. "Do you not know better than that?"
"Hazel," he said, gravely though full of tenderness,?"you and I are not going to live to ourselves?"
Like a statue, so the girl stood; but with a rush of thoughts that for a minute she could not head off.