The picture—­I may describe it here—­was that of a young man bound to a tree and pierced with arrows.  No human witnesses in sight, except in the extreme distance; and over sky and earth no sunlight, but instead the deepening shadows of night.  But the presence of the one was not noticed, nor the presence of the other missed.  Away from earth, and lifted above suffering, the martyr’s eyes looked to the opening clouds above his head, where were light, and heavenly messengers, and the palm-branch, and the crown.  Something in the calm clear face checked Miss Kennedy’s bursts of song as often as she turned that way—­the high look so beyond her reach.

‘What are you doing, Hazel?’ said Prim’s sweet voice.

’Puzzling,’—­said Hazel, jumping up, and lifting one hand to support the kitten.  ’Dr. Maryland, I am very glad to see you!  O Prim, how happy you must be!’

‘You didn’t look in the least like a person in a puzzle,’ said Primrose, after the first compliments were passed.  ’What could you be puzzling about, dear?’

’That picture.  It always puzzles me.  And so when I get befogged over other things, I often come here and add this to the number.’

’You are hardly far enough on in your studies yet, Miss Kennedy, to understand that picture,’ said Dr. Arthur, who was considering it very intently himself.

‘My studies!  Painting, do you mean?  Or what do you mean?’ said Wych Hazel.

‘What does the picture say to you, Miss Kennedy?’

‘That is just what I cannot find out,’ said Hazel, jumping up again and coming to stand at his side.  ’I cannot read it a bit.’

’You have not learned the characters in which it is written, yet,’ said Dr. Arthur, with a glance at her.

‘She had not learned much,’ said Primrose, smiling.

‘Can you read it?’ said Hazel, facing round.

‘Why yes, Hazel.’

‘Well,’ said the girl, half impatiently, ’then how come I to be such an ignoramus?’

‘There are some things,’ said Dr. Arthur, with another swift look at his companion, ’which everybody can learn at once.  But there are others, Miss Kennedy, which sometimes must wait until the Lord himself sets the lesson.  I think this is one of those.’

‘I shall ask your father,’ said Hazel, decidedly.  ’He always thinks I ought to know everything at once.’

‘Oh, Hazel, my dear, how can you say so?’ cried Prim.  ’Indeed, papa is never so unreasonable.  And there he is this minute, and you can ask him.’

The long windows of the room looked upon a stretch of greensward spotted with trees.  Coming across this bit of the grounds, Dr. Maryland and Rollo saw one of the windows open, and caught sight also of the party within.  Even as Dr. Maryland’s daughter spoke, they stepped upon the piazza and came into the room.

‘That is a picture of the loss of all things,’ Dr. Arthur was saying.  ‘How would you be able to understand?’ But then he stepped back, and left the explanation in other hands.