‘Now, Mr. Falkirk,’ said the girl, with her cheeks aglow, ’you know perfectly well I was not thinking of that.’

’Will you please to specify of what you were thinking, Miss Hazel?’

Miss Hazel leaned her head on her hand and reflected.

’I don’t believe I can, sir.  It was a kind of indefinite fortune,—­a whole windfall of queer adventures and people and things.’

Mr. Falkirk at this turned round from his papers and looked at the girl.  It was a pretty vision that he saw, and he regarded it somewhat steadily; with a little break of the line of the lips that yet was not merriment.

‘My dear,’ he said gravely, ’such birds seldom fly alone in a high wind.’

’Well, sir, never mind.  Could you be ready by Thursday, Mr. Falkirk?’

‘For what, Miss Hazel?’

‘Dear me!’ said the girl with a soft breath of impatience.  ’To set out, sir.  I think I shall go then, and I wanted to know if I am to have the pleasure of your company.’

‘Do I look like a fairy tale?’ said Mr. Falkirk.

He certainly did not!  A keen eye for practical realities, a sober good sense that never lost its foothold of common ground, were further unaccompanied by the graces and charms wherewith fairy tales delight to deck their favourites.  Besides which, Mr. Falkirk probably knew what his fortune was already, for the grey was abundantly mingled with the brown in his eyebrows and hair.  However, to do Miss Hazel’s guardian justice, if his face was not gracious, it was at least in some respects fine.  A man always to be respected, easily to be loved, sat there at the table, at his papers.

As for the little ‘nut-browne mayd’ who studied destiny in the fire, she merely glanced up at him in answer to this appeal; and with a shake of the head as if fairy tales and he were indeed hopelessly disconnected, returned to her musings.  Then suddenly burst forth—­

’I am so puzzled about the colour of my new travelling dress!  “Contrasts,” and “harmonies,” and all that stuff, belong to the pink and white people.  But pink and brown—­Mr. Falkirk, do you suppose I can find anything browner than myself, that will set me off, and do?—­I can’t travel in gold colour.’

’You want to have as much as possible the effect of a picture in a frame?’

’Not at all, sir.  That is just what I want to avoid.  The dress should be a part of the picture.’

‘I don’t doubt it will be!’ said Mr. Falkirk sighing.  ’Before you set out, my dear, had you not better invest your property? so that you could live upon the gathered interest if the capital should fail.’

‘I thought it was invested?’ said the girl, looking up.

‘Only a part of it,’ replied Mr. Falkirk.  ’Nothing but your money.’

‘Nothing but!’ said Wych Hazel.  ’Why what more have I, Mr. Falkirk?’

‘A young life,’ said her guardian,—­’a young and warm heart,—­ good looks, an excellent constitution, a head and hands that might do much.  To which I might add,—­an imagination.’