get married, too."

"He is perfectly right."

"I suppose old Eustace will be getting hitched up one of these days?"
said Sam.

Mrs. Hignett started violently.

"Why do you say that?"

"Eh?"

"What makes you say that?"

"Oh, well, he's a romantic sort of fellow. Writes poetry, and all that."

"There is no likelihood at all of Eustace marrying. He is of a shy and
retiring temperament, and sees few women. He is almost a recluse."

Sam was aware of this, and had frequently regretted it. He had always
been fond of his cousin in that half-amused and rather patronising way
in which men of thews and sinews are fond of the weaker brethren who run
more to pallor and intellect; and he had always felt that if Eustace had
not had to retire to Windles to spend his life with a woman whom from
his earliest years he had always considered the Empress of the Washouts,
much might have been made of him. Both at school and at Oxford, Eustace
had been--if not a sport--at least a decidedly cheery old bean. Sam
remembered Eustace at school, breaking gas globes with a slipper in a
positively rollicking manner. He remembered him at Oxford playing up to
him manfully at the piano on the occasion when he had done that
imitation of Frank Tinney which had been such a hit at the Trinity
smoker. Yes, Eustace had had the makings of a pretty sound egg, and it
was too bad that he had allowed his mother to coop him up down in the
country, miles away from anywhere.

"Eustace is returning to England on Saturday," said Mrs. Hignett. She
spoke a little wistfully. She had not been parted from her son since he
had come down from Oxford; and she would have liked to keep him with her
till the end of her lecturing tour. That, however, was out of the
question. It was imperative that, while she was away, he should be at
Windles. Nothing would have induced her to leave the place at the mercy
of servants who might trample over the flowerbeds, scratch the polished
floors, and forget to cover up the canary at night. "He sails on the
'Atlantic.'"

"That's splendid!" said Sam. "I'm sailing on the 'Atlantic' myself. I'll
go down to the office and see if we can't have a state-room together.
But where is he going to live when he gets to England?"

"Where is he going to live? Why, at Windles, of course. Where else?"

"But I thought you were letting Windles for the summer?"

Mrs. Hignett stared.

"Letting Windles!" She spoke as one might address a lunatic. "Wh