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A little brook, a brawling, ruffianly little brook, swaggered from side to side down the glade, swirling in white leaps over the great dark rocks and shouting challenge to the hillsides. Hollanden and the Worcester girls had halted in a place of ferns and wet moss. Their voices could be heard quarrelling above the clamour of the stream.
At the foot of the falls, where the mist arose in silver clouds and the green water swept into the pool, Miss Worcester, the elder, seated on the moss, exclaimed, "Oh, Mr. Hollanden, what makes all literary men so peculiar?" "And all that just because I said that I could have made better digestive organs than Providence, if it is true that he made mine," replied Hollanden, with reproach.
A smile swept the scowl from his face. "No, indeed," he said, instantly; "nothing is so important as that." She seemed aggrieved then. "Hum you didn't look so," she told him. "Well, I didn't mean to look any other way," he said contritely. "You know what a bear I am sometimes. Hollanden says it is a fixed scowl from trying to see uproarious pinks, yellows, and blues."
The children and all of us shall be anxious. I know you will like him." "Eh?" said Hollanden. "Oglethorpe? Oglethorpe? Why, he's that friend of the Fanhalls! Yes, of course, I know him! Deuced good fellow, too! What about him?" "Oh, nothing, only he's coming here to-morrow," answered Hawker. "What kind of a fellow did you say he was?" "Deuced good fellow!
"What are you giggling at?" said Hollanden. "I was thinking how furious he would be if he heard you call him a country swain," she rejoined. "Who?" asked Hollanden. Oglethorpe contended that the men who made the most money from books were the best authors. Hollanden contended that they were the worst. Oglethorpe said that such a question should be left to the people.
Hollanden replied, "What did you do with that violet she dropped at the side of the tennis court yesterday?" Mrs. Fanhall, with the two children, the Worcester girls, and Hollanden, clambered down the rocky path. Miss Fanhall and Hawker had remained on top of the ledge. Hollanden showed much zeal in conducting his contingent to the foot of the falls.
That?" he shouted, pointing thrust-way at it "that? It's vile! Aw! it makes me weary." "You're in a nice state," said Hollanden, turning to take a critical view of the painter. "What has got into you now? I swear, you are more kinds of a chump!" Hawker crooned dismally: "I can't paint! I can't paint for a damn! I'm no good. What in thunder was I invented for, anyhow, Hollie?"
Why, when I was in Brussels " "Oh, come now, Hollie, you never were in Brussels, you know," said the younger Worcester girl. "What of that, Millicent?" demanded Hollanden. "This is autobiography." "Well, I don't care, Hollie. You tell such whoppers." With a gesture of despair he again started away; whereupon the Worcester girls shouted in chorus, "Oh, I say, Hollie, come back! Don't be angry.
"Oh, nothing!" she replied at first, but later she added in an undertone, "That wretched Mrs. Truscot " "What did she say?" whispered the younger Worcester girl. "Why, she said oh, nothing!" Both Hollanden and Hawker were industriously reflecting. Later in the morning Hawker said privately to the girl, "I know what Mrs. Truscot talked to you about." She turned upon him belligerently. "You do?"
"I " began Hawker. "Oh, Hollie," cried the girl impetuously, "do tell me how to do that slam thing, you know. I've tried it so often, but I don't believe I hold my racket right. And you do it so beautifully." "Oh, that," said Hollanden. "It's not so very difficult. I'll show it to you. You don't want to know this minute, do you?" "Yes," she answered. "Well, come over to the court, then.
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