"Eh? You don't mean to say--after your journey, too--" "We'll get it over," said Captain Tobias firmly. Captain Cai could not but approve. Here was prompt occasion not only to repair and apologise for his small blunder, but to make Mrs Bosenna acquainted with his paragon. She would soon correct that unfortunate image of him as a coarse prize-fighting fellow. To tell the truth, while reproaching himself for having evoked that image by his clumsy praise, he had doubted it might be difficult to efface: knowing his friend's shyness of womankind. He had doubted that 'Bias, who (to use his own words) "shunned the fair sex in all its branches," might decline even to make the lady's acquaintance. Lo! here was that admirable man setting his face and--sternly, for friendship's sake--marching upon an introduction. What a friend! They took their way up the valley, walking side by side. For a long while both kept silence. "Pretty country!" by-and-by observed Captain Tobias. He paused as if to take stock of it, but his gaze was meditative rather than observant. "Suckin' pigs, too, . . ." he added after a while, and resumed his way. "What about 'em?" "Why, to drop in on a lone woman unexpected, an' find her sittin' down to roast suckin' pig . . . it's--it's like Solomon an' the lilies." Captain Cai flushed half-guiltily. "I didn't say I called quite unexpectedly, did I?" "To break the ice, was your words." "You see, I'd happened to meet Mrs Bosenna the evenin' before, an'--hullo!" They had come to the bend of the road beneath Rilla Farm, and either his eyesight had played him a trick or Captain Cai had caught a glimpse-- just a glimpse and no more--of a print gown some fifty yards ahead, where the hedge made an angle about a clump of trees. The small entrance gate and the footbridge lay just beyond this angle. "Hullo!" exclaimed Captain Cai. "What's up?" "Nothin'"--for the light apparition had vanished. "Besides, she'd be wearin' black, o' course." "I wish you'd talk more coherent," said Captain Tobias, stopping short again and eyeing him. "I put it to you, now. Here I be, tumbled out 'pon a terminus platform in a country I've never set eyes on. As if that wasn' enough, straightaway things start to happen so that I want to hold my head. And as if _that_ wasn' enough, you work loose on the jawin' tacks till steerage way there's none. I put it to you." "I'm sorry, 'Bias," Cai assured him contritely as they moved on. "Maybe I'm upset by the pleasure o' seein' ye here. Many a time I've picter'd it, an'--I don't know if you've noticed, but these little things never _do_ fall out just like a man expects." "I've noticed it to-day, right enough," said Tobias with some emphasis. But he was mollified, and indeed seemed on the point of adding a word when of a sudden he came to yet another halt and eyed his friend more reproachfully than ever--no, not reproachfully save by implication: with bewilderment rather, and helpless surmise.