true, Dr. Maryland, that she says about me----and----Mr.
Rollo?' The words half choked her, but she got them out. 'The
will?--don't you know?--you must know! Is it true?'

'What are you talking of, Hazel? Sit down, my dear. Prudentia?
What has she been talking to you about? I hope--'

'My father's will,--does she know?' Hazel repeated.

'Your father's will?--Prudentia?--Has she been talking to you of
that! My dear, that was not necessary. It was not needful that
you should hear anything about it; not now. I am sorry.
Prudentia must have forgotten herself!' Dr. Maryland looked
seriously disturbed.

'You do not tell me!' cried the girl. 'Dr. Maryland, is it
true, what she says?'

'I do not know what she has said, my dear. But you need not be
troubled about it. It was a kind will, and I think on the
whole a wise one,--guarded on every side. What has Prudentia
said to you, Hazel?' The Doctor spoke with grave authority
now.

To which Miss Kennedy replied characteristically. She had
caught up the words as he went on,--'not needful she should
know,'--'she need not be troubled,'--then it was true! Everybody
knew it except herself; everybody was doubtless also wondering
how it felt! For a second she looked straight into her old
friend's face, trying vainly to find a negative there, and
then without a word she was off. And if Lewis had been called
upon to bear witness, he might have said that his young
mistress flew into the saddle, and then flew home.

CHAPTER XXXI.

WHOSE WILL?

A great new sorrow is a many-cornered thing; having its sharp
points that sting, and its jagged points that wound; with
others so dull and heavy and immoveable that one is ready to
wish they could pierce through and make an end. And it is
quite impossible to tell beforehand on which of them we may
happen to strike first.

Wych Hazel tried them all on her way home; but when that last
one came, it stayed; and through all the sharpness of the
others--through anger and mortification and the keen sense of
injury, and the fiery rebellion against control--the moveless
weight upon her breast was worse than all. What was it? What
laid it there? Not much to look at. A poor little plant, cut
down and fallen--that was all. Nobody knew when it started, and
no one could say that it would ever bloom: it had been
doubtful and shy of its own existence, and she herself had
never guessed it was there, till suddenly its fragrance was
all around. And e