r an exploration of--Fuegia, let us say--would place him among the
scientists of the world."

The thought that raced across Deena's mind was what dull reading it
would be, but she recognized the impropriety of the reflection and
said, simply:

"It is too bad we haven't a little more money."

Stephen put his hand in his breast pocket and half drew out a letter,
and then let it drop back, and then he walked a little apart from
Deena and looked at her thoughtfully, as if trying to readjust his
previous ideas of her to the present coquetry of her appearance. The
way her thoughts had flown to Simeon when a desert island existence
was mooted seemed as if she did care, and Stephen hated to give pain,
and yet the letter had to be answered, and the opportunity was not
likely to occur again. The thing he had always admired most in his
friend's wife was her common sense--to that he trusted.

"Mrs. Ponsonby," he said, boldly, "if Simeon had a chance to do this
very thing--free of expense--would you be unhappy at his desertion?
Would you feel that the man who sent him to Patagonia was doing you an
unkindness you could not forgive?"

"I should rejoice at his good fortune," she answered, calmly. "The
fact that I should miss him would not weigh with me for a moment."

French gave a sigh of relief, while his imagination pictured to him a
dissolving view of Polly under similar circumstances.

"The Argentine Government is fitting up an expedition," he went on,
"to go through the Straits of Magellan and down the east coast of
Fuegia with a view of finding out something more exact in regard to
the mineral and agricultural resources than has been known hitherto. I
happen to have been in active correspondence for some time with the
man who virtually set the thing going, and he has asked me to send him
a botanist from here. Shall I offer the chance to your husband? He
must go at once. It is already spring in that part of the world, and
the summer at Cape Horn is short."

Deena's face grew crimson and then paled. She felt an emotion she
could not believe--pure, unalloyed joy! But in a second she understood
better; it was joy, of course, but joy at Simeon's good luck.

"Could he get leave of absence right in the beginning of the term?"
she asked, breathlessly.

And Stephen answered that he had never taken his Sabbatical year, and
that some one could be found to do his work, though it might mean
forfeiting half his salary.

Here the