’But,’ I protested, ’what is the hurry, there was such a pretty girl looking at you in that shop.’ ’Meg, will you come, there’s a man staring at you.’ ’But I don’t mind the pretty girl staring at you, Ross;’ but my brother said,— ’One really couldn’t have one’s women stared at by a chap like that.’ ’Really, Ross,’ I said, ’I’m not a harem.’ ’You’re a jolly sight more trouble to look after.’ ’Oh, have you had much experience,’ I asked. And then he said I was ’abominable.’ So we walked on. ’No,’ said my brother, reverting violently to my education, ’girls’ schools are simply rotten. I could run one better than your woman did. Don’t even seem to have fed you properly, judging by the size you’ve grown, or rather not grown. I wonder if it’s too late to bring an action for insufficient nourishment considering the price paid. There’s one thing you do really well though, and that’s arithmetic.’ So I cheered up. ’I never knew anybody, no, not any single person that could add up her wants so accurately and subtract them from her husband’s bank balance with such lightning speed.’ ’I think, Ross,’ I said with dignity, ’it would be better if we went back to St Julian’s.’ So he read out:— ’"10 bed and dressing-rooms, 5 reception rooms, 6 acres of pleasure gardens, stabling and coachhouse, usual domestic offices. For sale only." ’Here’s another:— ’"Charming country cottage for sale, 5 miles from Whittington station, combines old-world charm with every modern convenience, capable of being added to." ’Oh! Meg, isn’t it priceless? Let’s get a taxi and go and see them. Mop up your eyes, child, I don’t want to look as if I were eloping with an unwilling bride.’ We got to the ’charming country cottage’ first. It was miles away from anywhere. It was a bungalow—at least I suppose it was, at any rate the upper storey had disappeared. It seemed to be nearly tumbling down. There was only one large room, with a lovely old bread oven and one or two small cupboard-like apartments leading out of it. I stared at it in amazement. ’Capable of being added to?’ ’Of course,’ said Ross, ’very true, indeed, about the only thing you could honestly say of it. You could build a new house around it and use the present structure for a coal-hole. Next, please. I feel St Julian’s will be the one, Florrie.’ This, however, proved to be a young barrack. If there were eighteen rooms, there were hundreds, I should think. The type of house that a polygamist might fancy. Damp oozed from the walls and most of the paper had peeled off and lay in little mouldering heaps on the floor. Rats scuttled in the wainscoting, and in the bathroom, which was on the ground floor, lay two or three of the largest cockroaches I have ever seen.