Only one of all whom the special train had brought down failed to return in it. Mary O’Dwyer slipped out of the convent before the speeches began, and wandered away towards the desolate stony hill where the stream which turns the factory mill took its rise. It grieved her to miss the cup of tea which a friendly nun had led her to expect; but even tea might be too dearly purchased, and Miss O’Dwyer had a strong dislike to listening to what Augusta Goold described as the ‘sugared hypocrisies of professional liars.’ Besides, she had her cigarette-case in her pocket, and a smoke, unattainable for her in the convent or the train, was much to be desired. She left the road at the foot of the hill, and picked her way along the rough bohireen which led upwards along the course of the stream. After awhile even this track disappeared. The stream tumbled noisily over rocks and stones, the bog-stained water glowing auburn-coloured in the sunlight. The ling and heather were springy under her feet, and the air was sweet with the scent of the bog-myrtle. She spied round her for a rock which cast a shade upon the kind of heathery bed she had set her heart to find. Her eyes lit upon a little party--a young man and two girls--encamped with a kettle, a spirit-stove, and a store of bread-and-butter. Her renunciation of the convent tea had not been made without a pang. She looked longingly at the steam which already spouted from the kettle. The young man said a few words to the girls, then stood up, raised his hat to her, and beckoned. She approached him, wondering. ‘Surely it can’t be--I really believe it is----’ ‘Yes, Miss O’Dwyer, it really is myself, Hyacinth Conneally.’ ‘My dear boy, you are the last person I expected to meet, though of course I knew you were somewhere down in these parts.’ ‘Come and have some tea,’ said Hyacinth. ‘And let me introduce you to Miss Beecher and Miss Elsie Beecher.’ Miss O’Dwyer took stock of the two girls. ‘They make their own clothes,’ she thought, ‘and apparently only see last year’s fashion-plates. The eldest isn’t bad-looking. How is it all West of Ireland girls have such glorious complexions? Her figure wouldn’t be bad if her mother bought her a decent pair of stays. I wonder who they are, and what they are doing here with Hyacinth. They can’t be his sisters.’ While they drank their tea certain glances and smiles gave her an inkling of the truth. ‘I suppose Hyacinth is engaged to the elder one,’ she concluded. ‘That kind of girl wouldn’t dare to make eyes at a man unless she had some kind of right to him.’ After tea she produced her cigarette-case. ‘I hope you don’t mind,’ she said to Marion. ‘I know it’s very shocking, but I’ve had a tiring day and an excellent tea, and oh, this heather is delicious to lie on!’ She stretched herself at full length as she spoke. ‘I really must smoke, just to arrive at perfect felicity for once in my life. How happy you people ought to be who always have in a place like this!’