"It was with mingled pleasure and pain that I read your letter. I know full well you are lonely. In my girlhood I can remember you as a kindly, sociable man—sociable in a domestic sense: I cannot remember that you ever cared for society. And it is unlikely that one should so change in one’s later years as to be happy and content, with doors barred against one’s nearest kin; living on alone, entertaining hard thoughts and, dear uncle, let me say unjust thoughts, of those of whom one was once fond. I gladly take the extended olive-branch. "Do not think me ungenerous, if I say that I cannot make up my mind to allow Hazel to stay with you. She is my only daughter, and your house, devoid as it is of women-folk, is not the place I should choose for a young girl. May I suggest that she should come to spend a day with you, and, need I say, dear uncle, how pleased I should be if you would visit us here, if you could bring yourself to put up with our plain faring and simple ways? "Your affectionate niece, "HELEN LE MESURIER. "P.S.—We can easily accommodate your servant." "OSBORNE HOUSE, LANCASTER GATE, "_July_ 14, 19—. "MY DEAR HELEN, "I must not grumble at your decision. I will think over the proposal you make, that I should come down to Hazelhurst to stay a while. In the meantime send the girl on Friday next, if convenient to you. The carriage shall meet the train. "Your affectionate uncle "PERCIVAL DESBOROUGH.’ When Hazel heard she was asked to go and see her uncle again, she was half pleased, half dismayed. The plan she was evolving for helping Teddie was at once made simpler: for it was to Uncle Percival that she was about to turn for aid, if she could sufficiently crush down her pride. The very difficulty of getting to him, had made her plan seem easy and feasible. But now that this difficulty was removed, she found her little scheme of a sudden assume terrible proportions. However, there was no harm in going: there was nothing _infra dig._ or humiliating in that; and once there, she could feel her way as to what she should confide and what leave unsaid. When Paul Charteris heard of the prospective visit, he begged to be allowed to drive Hazel to the station; and Helen agreed that it was a long, hot, dusty walk with which to begin a day’s outing. "I think," she added, "that you may take it for granted that Hazel will like to drive—she is not here to ask—yet she was a moment ago. Where has she gone?" No, of course, Hazel was not there. She had heard Paul coming, and, with a murmured excuse to her mother, had fled precipitately. "By the way, dear, Paul proposes driving you to the station," her mother told her, when the eventful day arrived. The girl flushed, and then grew pale. "Oh, mother," she exclaimed. "I should rather have walked. Miles could have taken me."