Wych Hazel had been in an altogether quiet mood since the arrival of the rockaway.  In that mood she had watched the unpacking of the basket, in that mood she had eaten her dinner.  It was strange, even to herself, the sort of quietus Mr. Rollo was to her.  Not feeling free to play with him, by no means disposed to play before him, she had ventured to offer her services no further than by asking him what he wanted; then left him to himself; oddly conscious all the while, that if it had been any other one of her new feline friends, she would have put her little hand into the business and the basket with pleasant effect.  So she sat still and watched him,—­giving a bit of a smile now and then indeed to his direct remarks, but as often only a fuller look of the brown eyes.  Since the gentleman had been under the tree she had been idly busy with her own thoughts, having sketched herself tired in the morning.  “Prim” she recognized at once—­Dr. Maryland’s sister,—­she had heard him speak of her.  Would she be a friend? any one to whom these many thoughts might come out?  So Wych Hazel sat, gazing out upon the lengthening shadows, leaning her head somewhat wearily in her hand, wishing the journey over and herself on her own vantage ground at Chickaree.  It would be such a help to be mistress of the house!—­for these last two days she had been nothing but a brown parcel, marked “fragile”—­“with care.”

CHAPTER X.

CHICKAREE.

Rollo had driven the rockaway down and was going to drive back.  He put Wych Hazel into the carriage, recommending to her to lean back in the corner and go to sleep.  Phoebe was given the place beside her; Mr. Falkirk mounted to the front seat; and off they drove.

It was about four o’clock of a fine June day, and the air was good to breathe; but the way was nothing extraordinary.  A pleasant country, nothing more; easy roads for an hour, then heavier travelling.

The afternoon wore on; the miles were plodded over; as the sun was dipping towards the western horizon they came into scenery of a new quality.  At once more wild and more dressed; the ground bolder and more rocky in parts, but between filled with gentler indications.  The rockaway drew up.  The driver looked back into the carriage, while the other gentleman got down.

’Miss Kennedy, if you will change places with Mr. Falkirk now you will be rewarded.  I have something here a great deal better than that book.’

’I have not been reading—­I have been watching for landmarks for some time,’ she said, as she made the change; ’but I think I can never have gone to Chickaree by this road.’

The change was great.  However fair it had looked from withinside, as soon as she got out on the front seat Wych Hazel found that a flood of bright, slant sunbeams were searching out all the beauty there was in the land, and winning it into view.  It was one of those illuminated hours, that are to the common day as an old painted and jewelled missal to an ordinary black letter.