"Well?" grunted Uncle Percival, as she paused.
"I have taken a story I have written to a publisher—an editor, I should say. I very much want to earn some money, and I find I can write," she added modestly. "Teddie met me in town and went with me—I am glad he did. He always impresses people so favourably. And when we got back to the station we found that I had two hours to wait for a train."
"So he brought you here?" Mr. Desborough inquired.
"Oh no," Hazel replied, in a tone that might imply that Teddie would not have done so under any consideration. "Oh no, he left me in a first-class ladies’ waiting-room—he had to go back to his office, you know—and while I was sitting there I remembered how near you were, and how often I had thought that some day, unknown to any one, I would come to see you and try to make friends. Don’t you think we might be friends, you and I?" she added ingenuously.
"What do you want money for?" her uncle inquired, evasively.
"Just pocket-money," Hazel said. "I am always running out of it. You would not believe how inconvenient it is. I am always seeing new ways of earning some. I see one to-day—only mother would not let me."
"What do you think of doing?" her uncle asked. He was becoming interested, and almost amiable—he, who had been interested in nothing and in no one but self for years. He admired this bright, gentle girl in spite of himself; he was beginning to dread the moment when she would get up and say she must go.
"You will laugh," Hazel returned, "but my latest idea is to be a companion—to you—for so much a week, you know: that would mean that you could dismiss me, or that I could leave you, at a week’s notice. If I went without _any_ notice, quite suddenly, I should have to forgo a week’s salary. But it would never do," she continued reflectively, "mother would never let me. She says she must always have me with her. But it is a pity. There is no doubt you need a companion, and I certainly want money."
"I much prefer living by myself," her uncle replied brusquely. "I don’t want any companion."
"I think you do," Hazel returned, standing to her opinion bravely. "To begin with, look at this room!"
"What of it?" her uncle asked harshly. "It is a very good room, well furnished, capacious, comfortable."