t gets put
together; and it is beautiful, and large, and whole, somewhere."

"Miss Craydocke always knows," said Hazel.

Nobody said anything again, about Uncle Titus. A winter's plan need
not be referred to him. But Hazel, in her own mind, had resolved to
find out what was Uncle Titus's, generally and theoretically; how
free they were to be, beyond winter plans and visits of weeks; how
much scope they might have with this money and this house, that
seemed so ample to their simple wants, and what they might do with
it and turn it into, if it came into their heads or hearts or
consciences.

So one day she went in and sat down by him in the study, after she
had accomplished some household errand with Rachel Froke.

Other people approached him with more or less of strategy, afraid of
the tiger in him; Desire Ledwith faced him courageously; only Hazel
came and nestled up beside him, in his very cage, as if he were no
wild beast, after all.

Yet he pretended to growl, even at her, sometimes; it was so funny
to see her look up and chirp on after it, like some little bird to
whom the language of beasts was no language at all, and passed by on
the air as a very big sound, but one that in no wise concerned it.

"We've got Sulie Praile to spend the winter, Uncle Titus," she said.

"Who's Sulie Praile?"

"The lame girl, from the Home. We wanted somebody for Vash to wait
on, you know. She sits in a round chair, that twists, like yours;
and she's--just like a lily in a vase!" Hazel finished her sentence
with a simile quite unexpected to herself.

There was something in Sulie's fair, pale, delicate face, and her
upper figure, rising with its own peculiar lithe, easily swayed
grace from among the gathered folds of the dress of her favorite
dark green color, that reminded--if one thought of it, and Hazel
turned the feeling of it into a thought at just this moment--of a
beautiful white flower, tenderly and commodiously planted.

"Well, I suppose it's worth while to have a lame girl to sit up in a
round chair, and look like a lily in a vase, is it?"

"Uncle Titus, I want to know what you think about some things."

"That is just what I want to know myself, sometimes. To find out
what one thinks about things, is pretty much the whole finding,
isn't it?"

"Don't be very metaphysical, please, Uncle Titus. Don't turn your
eyes round into the back of your head. That isn't what I mean."

"What do you mean?"

"Just plain look