Two days later, Teddie and Hazel, she seated on far-stretching, hopelessly tangled tree-roots, he prone upon his back on the dry moss, disported themselves in the leafy shade of the beloved greenwood, deep in consultation on the same momentous question that Hazel had endeavoured to solve alone: how might she earn money? Typewriting had been discussed, but the idea was soon abandoned, Teddie informing his sister that, to be successful in that branch of industry, a peculiar kind of appearance was desirable—indeed, was essentially needful—an appearance that Hazel entirely lacked, as she herself would admit, could she see "the sort" that frequented the office adjoining Mr. Hamilton’s. "Why," the boy declared, "they would simply stare if _you_ suddenly turned up there and asked for a job, and the boss would inquire delicately where your mother was, and would instruct his head clerk to take you back to her." "I should not go like this," Hazel returned, deprecatingly, fingering a piece of her white spotted muslin, and eyeing her brother wistfully. "I should probably have a tailor-made tweed dress, and a man’s straw hat, and thick boots, and a stand-up collar and tie. You have no idea how—how strong-minded I could look, if I had the proper dress for bringing it out. Most women owe it to their dress: I am quite sure they don’t feel and stride about like that, in their dressing-gowns." She regarded him pleadingly; the mere thought of becoming one of the City band—the doing away for ever with the dolorous Monday morning partings—above all, the obtaining of means to supply her mother with endless little luxuries, made the proposition a very tempting one to the girl. But Teddie shook his head. "It is a peculiar _stamp_," he said musingly, "and, take my word for it, Hazel, it is not all in the clothes. Why, some of them dress quite æsthetically; but it is no go, they are typewriters. Not that I disapprove of them as a class," he hastened to add. "If it comes to that, some of them are quite pretty, but—well, you would not do, and that is all about it." There was a short silence. The sun glinted in and out among the tree-branches in shimmering shafts of yellow light, the leaves quivered slightly in the still air, the birds chirped, and Hazel sighed. "Besides," Teddie continued, feeling perhaps that he had been somewhat unsympathetically sweeping in his assertions, "there would be the expense of learning. You don’t become a full-blown typewriter all at once, you know. You don’t just sit down and manage it, so to speak, as you happen to be able to play the piano—without lessons."