front?' said Rollo.

'Some of them. Why?'

'Then, by your leave, as I do not care to act the Merry Andrew
for half a dozen pair of eyes, I will go to the rear to
mount.' But instead of his more stately salutation, he held
out his hand to Wych Hazel with a smile.

'Good bye,' she said. 'I am sorry you have had such a hot
walk. But why don't you mount here?'

'I like to choose my audience when I exhibit.'

He clasped Wych Hazel's hand after the fashion of the other
day; then disappeared one way as she went the other.

Passing swiftly on, holding up her long riding skirt so that
it seemed no encumbrance, musing to herself on past events and
present expectations; and not without a certain flutter of
pleasure and amusement and timidity at the part she had to
fill, Wych Hazel reached the low, broad steps and went in.

A slender little person, as airy and independent as the bush
she was named for; one of those figures that never by any
chance fall into any attitude or take any pose that is not
lovely. Hair--as to arrangement--decidedly the worse for the
walk; cheeks a little warmed up with the sun, and perhaps
other things; grave eyes, where the woman was but beginning to
supplant the child; a mouth as sweet as it could be, in all
its changes; and a hand and foot that were fabulous. So the
mistress of Chickaree went in to receive her first instalment
of visitors.

CHAPTER XIV.

HOLDING COURT.

She was scarcely within the door when Mr. Falkirk met her, put
her arm within his and led her into the drawing-room. For a
few minutes there the impression was merely of a flutter of
gauzes, a shifting scene of French bonnets, a show of
delicately gloved hands, and a general breeze of compliments
and gratulations, in those soft and indeterminate tones that
stir nothing. Mme. Lasalle it was, with a bevy of ladies,
older and younger, among whom it was impossible at first to
distinguish one from the other. So similar was in every case
the display of French flowers, gloves and embroidery; so
accordant the make of every dress and the modulation of every
tone. Mme. Lasalle herself was, however, prominent, having a
pair of black eyes which once fairly seen were for ever after
easily recognizable. Fine eyes, too; bright and merry, which
made themselves quite at home in your face in half a minute.
She was overflowing with graciousness. Her nephew, the
gentleman of the roses, the only cavalier of the party, kept
himself in a