'What made you faint at Gyda's?—and why have you slept three whole days since?' he said gravely. 'You had better not bring it up, Wych, or I shall want comfort again.' 'O—these three days?' said Hazel. 'I have just been having my own way; as I told Mr. Falkirk; and it has agreed with me splendidly. It was no doing of mine, to send for Dr. Maryland—but Byo always fidgets over me.' 'And the fainting?—and the walk over the hill? over rough and smooth, where your little feet must have had a hard time of it;— and you laid it up against me?' What had Gyda told him? Not _that_, for that was not true. But what? Hazel's head drooped lower. 'Mr. Rollo,' she said seriously, 'if you do not cure yourself of your habit of making statements, some day you will acquire the habit of making mistakes.' 'No, I shall not,' he said coolly. 'You will not let me.' If _that_ were one, Hazel made no attempt to correct it; having no mind just then to deal with any of his mistakes, in any shape; remembering too exactly what some of them had been. So she sat very still, looking down at the two small folded hands, and wondered to herself if Mr. Rollo had cross-questioned Gyda? if he meant to cross-question her?—and if he did, where she should hide? That fainting, that walk across the hill!—even now, with three long days of oblivion between, and the sorrow and the doubt all pushed aside; even now, she could hardly bear the recollection; and just caught the deep sigh that was coming, and shut her lips tight, and kept it back. And _that_ was what had troubled him! The colour flitted and changed in her cheeks, in the sort of _live_ way Wych Hazel's colour had, and then the brown eyes gave a swift sidelong glance, to see what the owner of the grey ones was about? He was studying her, as if he had a mind to find out all her thoughts in their secret hiding-places. But his attention was diverted now to something in his fingers, which he was unfolding and unwrapping; and presently he took one of the little folded hands, the left one, and put upon the forefinger a ring set with a very large emerald. The ring fitted; the stone was superb. Rollo laid the little hand, so beringed, in his own palm, and looked at it there; then his eye met Hazel's with a bright, sweet, peculiar smile. 'We shall never misunderstand each other again, Wych! Shall we?' It was queer, to see the colour recede and get out of sight, as if gathering strength for its vivid return. But Hazel did not look at him, nor at the ring, not at anything,—did not see anything, probably, just then. She caught her breath a little, finding her words one by one— 'But —I—never—misunderstood—you,' she said. 'Would you like to stand an examination on that point?' Hazel considered a little. 'I am willing to hear any—statements.'