he asked him, smoothing out his short, dark curls,
as she spoke. "Can't you tell me? Is it some great trouble?"

For answer he dragged himself a little closer to her, and bowed his hot
forehead on one of her hands, which she was resting on the ground, while
she stroked his hair with the other. The action touched her; she did not
know why. His sobs were quietening. He was by no means very manly, as
English people understand manliness, but even he was ashamed to be found
crying like a baby over his woes.

"Dear Hugo, can you not tell me what is wrong?" said Angela, more
seriously alarmed by his silence than by his tears. She had a right to
question him, for he had previously given her as much of his confidence
as he ever gave to anybody, and she had been a very good friend to him.
"Are you in some great trouble?"

"Yes," he said, in a voice so choked that she could hardly hear the
word.

"And you have been in some scuffle surely. Your clothes are torn--you
are hurt!" said she, sympathetically. "Why, Hugo, you must have been
fighting!" Then, as he gave her no answer, she resumed in a voice of
tender concern, "You are not really hurt, are you, dear boy? You can
move--you can get up? Shall I fetch anyone to help you?"

"No, no, no!" he cried, clutching at her dress, as though to stay her
going. "Don't leave me. I am not hurt--at least, I can walk and stand
easily enough, though I have been hurt--set upon, and treated like--like
a dog by him----"

"By whom, Hugo?" said Angela, startled by the tenor of his incoherent
sentences. "Who has set upon you and ill-treated you?"

But Hugo hid his face. "I won't tell you," he said, sullenly.

There was a silence. "Can I do anything for you?" Angela asked at
length, very gently.

"No."

She waited a little longer, and, as he made no further sign, she tried
to rise. "Shall I go, Hugo?" she said.

"Yes--if you like." Then he burst out passionately, "Of course, you will
go. You are like everybody else. You are like Richard Luttrell. You will
do what he tells you. I am abandoned by everybody. You all hate me; and
I hate you all!"

Little as Angela understood his words, there was something in them that
made her seat herself beside him on the grass, instead of leaving him
alone. "Dear Hugo," she said, "I have never hated you."

"But you will soon."

"I see," said she, softly. "I understand you now. You are in
trouble--you have been doing something wrong, and you think that w