'There!' cried she; 'now you're as flushed as you were pale. It's the fever. I'll mix you something that will soon put you all right.' 'I only wish you could,' he sighed. 'And what I wanted,' said she, catching at her previous thought in the same blind way as she caught at her skirts on muddy days--'what I wanted, dear, was--it's so heavy, the cake--' 'You want me to lift it, mother?' 'Yes, my dear. How well you know! And mind not to spoil the icing; it's so hard not to, it being so white and brittle.' 'No, I won't spoil the white,' he said earnestly, 'however hard it is.' She did not notice that the earnestness was unnatural; intense earnestness in household matters was her normal state. Chapter 16 The stately May morning, caparisoned in diamonds, full of the solemnity that perfect beauty wears, had come out of the purple mist and shamed the hovel where Hazel dressed for her bridal. The cottage had sunk almost out of recognition in the foam of spring. Ancient lilacs stood about it and nodded purple-coroneted heads across its one chimney. Their scent bore down all other scents like a strong personality and there was no choice but to think the thoughts of the lilac. Two laburnums, forked and huge of trunk, fingered the roof with their lower branches and dripped gold on it. The upper branches sprang far into the blue. The may-tree by the gate knew its perfect moment, covered with crystal buds that shone like rain among the bright green leaves. From every pear-tree--full-blossomed, dropping petals--and from every shell-pink apple-tree came the roar of the bees. Abel rose very early, for he considered it the proper thing to make a wreath for Hazel, being an artist in such matters. The lilies-of-the-valley-were almost out; he had put some in warm water overnight, and now he sat beneath the horse-chestnut and worked at the wreath. The shadows of the leaves rippled over him like water, and often he looked up at the white spires of bloom with a proprietary eye, for his bees were working there with a ferocity of industry. He was moody and miserable, for he thought of the township of hives that Hazel might have won for him. He comforted himself with the thought that there would be something saved on her keep. It never occurred to him to be sorry to lose her; in fact, there was little reason why he should be. Each had lived a lonely, self-sufficing life; they were entirely unsuitable companions for each other. He wove the wet lilies, rather limp from the hot water, on to a piece of wire taken from one of his wreath-frames. So Hazel went to her bridal in a funeral wreath. She awoke very tired from the crisis yesterday, but happy. She and Foxy and the one-eyed cat, her rabbit, and the blackbird, were going to a country far from troublous things, to the peace of Edward's love on the slope of God's Little Mountain.