re possible to find a way
out that would not prove still more painfully complicated.

At the moment the ting-tang of a steamer bell bound outward to the
northern coast, borne to her on the river-breeze, intensified her
desire for escape from conventional limitations. Oh! to find herself
under totally new conditions! The heavy fragrance of magnolia and
gardenia blossoms seemed freighted with exotic suggestion. The tropical
odours blended with the perfume of autumn roses, which made a trellis
over her head and overran the balustrades. The subtle mingling of
perfumes that float in the clear air of an Australian garden, when the
fierce heats of summer are gone, gave her a sense of almost
intoxication.

In fact, Bridget was in the mood for any desperate leap into the
Unknown. Such was her unconscious thought as she crunched a spray of
verbena in her fingers and inhaled the scent which had always a faintly
heady effect upon her imagination. She was leaning on the stone kerb of
the balustrade, vague emotions stirring her, when she heard McKeith's
step on the gravel. Presently he stood beside her, his tall form, in
the well-cut evening suit which always became him best, towering head
and shoulders above her small stature. It was always a satisfaction to
Lady Bridget, fastidious in such masculine details, that he was
particular about his tailoring, and tonight he exhaled the scent of one
of Sir Luke Tallant's excellent cigars. There used to be a good deal of
chaff between them about one of his personal predilections which jarred
a little upon Bridget--his pipe and, particularly, the quality of his
tobacco. But he did not change it in spite of her chaff. She was
beginning to find a certain mule-like obstinacy about him in
unimportant details.

'If you object to this, what WOULD you say to the store tobacco smoke
when I'm in the Bush?' he said. And then he had explained that, when
camping out with the stockmen on their expeditions after cattle, he
always smoked the same tobacco that he supplied to his hands. That was
according to HIS rule of social equality by the camp fire, he said....
And where was all Lady Bridget's vaunted socialism if she jibbed at
such a simple illustration of the first principles of socialism? Of
course, Bridget had taken his banter in good part, and with a pretty
grimace had told him she would get out a consignment of the stuff her
Aunt Eliza gave at Christmas to the old men in their Irish village and