No doubt of that.--Honolulu--by Jove! it's an idea. I should like to
see those islands myself.'

'And it isn't commonplace,' remarked Sibyl. 'One would go off with a
certain eclat. Very different from starting for the Continent in the
humdrum way.'

The more Carnaby thought of it, the better he liked this suggestion.
That Sibyl should voluntarily propose so long a journey surprised and
delighted him. The tropics were not his favourite region, and those
islands of the Pacific offered no scope for profitable energy; he did
not want to climb volcanoes, still less to lounge beneath bananas and
breadfruit-trees, however pleasant such an escape from civilisation
might seem at the first glance. A year of marriage, of idleness amid
amusements, luxuries, extravagances, for which he had no taste, was
bearing its natural result in masculine restiveness. His robust
physique and temper, essentially combative, demanded liberty under
conditions of rude or violent life. He was not likely to find a
satisfying range in any mode of existence that would be shared by
Sibyl. But he clutched at any chance of extensive travel. It might be
necessary--it certainly would be--to make further incision into his
capital, and so diminish the annual return upon which he could count
for the future; but when his income had already become ludicrously
inadequate, what did that matter? The years of independence were past;
somehow or other, he must make money. Everybody did it nowadays, and an
'opening' would of course present itself, something would of course
'turn up'.

He stretched his limbs in a sudden vast relief.

'Bravo! The idea is excellent. Shall we sell all this stuff?' waving a
hand to indicate the furniture.

'Oh, I think not. Warehouse it.'

Hugh would have rejoiced to turn every chair and table into hard cash,
not only for the money's sake, but for the sense of freedom that would
follow; but he agreed, as always, to whatever his wife preferred. They
talked with unwonted animation. A great atlas was opened, routes were
fingered; half the earth's circumference vanished in a twinkling.
Sibyl, hitherto mewed within the circle of European gaieties and
relaxations, all at once let her fancy fly--tasted a new luxury in
experiences from which she had shrunk.

'I'll order my outfit tomorrow. Very light things, I suppose? Who could
advise me about that?'

Among a number of notes and letters which she wrote next day was one to
Miss Frothingham