The expedition was chiefly remarkable (to the observant eye of Mrs. Ames) for the efforts made by its conductor to get lost in suitable company--an enterprise which was invariably frustrated by the resolute conduct of that small but determined hero-worshipper, Miss Joan Gaymer. On one occasion, however, Hughie and Miss Freshwater were left together for a moment. The party had finished surveying the prospect from the roof of the College Chapel, and were painfully groping their way in single file down a spiral staircase. Only Hughie, Miss Freshwater, and the ubiquitous Miss Gaymer were left at the top. "You go next, Joey," said Hughie; "then Miss Freshwater, then me." The lady addressed plunged obediently into the gloomy chasm at her feet. She observed with frank jealousy that the other two did not immediately follow her, and accordingly waited for them in the belfry half-way down. Presently she heard their footsteps descending; and Miss Freshwater's voice said:-- "I wanted to tell you about it first of anybody, Hughie, because you and I have always been such friends. Nobody else knows yet." There was a silence, broken only by Hughie's footsteps, evidently negotiating a difficult turn. Then Miss Freshwater's voice continued, a little wistfully:-- "Aren't you going to congratulate me?" And Hughie's voice, sounding strangely sepulchral in the echoing darkness, replied:-- "Rather! I--I--hope you'll be very happy. Mind that step." Miss Gaymer wondered what it was all about. Hughie found an opportunity before the day was over of holding another brief conversation with his uncle, in the course of which he expressed an opinion on the advantages of immediate and extensive foreign travel which sent that opponent of early marriages back to town in a thoroughly satisfied frame of mind. "There ought to be a statue," said Jimmy Marrable to his cigar, as he leaned back reflectively in his railway carriage, "set up in the capital of every British Colony, representing a female figure in an attitude of aloofness, and inscribed: _Erected by a grateful Colony to its Principal Emigration Agent--The Girl at Home Who Married Somebody Else_." Then he sighed to himself--rather forlornly, a woman would have said. CHAPTER IV AN UNDERSTUDY "_The indulgence of the audience is asked on behalf of Miss Joan Gaymer, who, owing to the sudden indisposition of Miss Mildred Freshwater, has taken up that lady's part at very short notice._" A couple of hours later Hughie, roaring very gently for so great a lion, was engaged in paddling a Canadian canoe down to Ditton Corner.