“Thank you,” Isabel said. “I appreciate your kindness at its full, but you must not ask me again. I shall remain at Knightswell till I go to London.” He made a slight motion of assent with his hand. “Now to think,” Isabel said, with sudden recovery of good-humour--that sort of “well done, resolution!” which we utter to ourselves with cheering effect--“that you should have troubled to come all this way on what you might have known was an errand of disappointment!” “Oh, I wanted, in any case, to see you before starting. I should have been very disappointed if I had missed you.” He began at once to give a lively sketch of the expedition he had planned, and Isabel listened with much attention, though she interposed no remarks. “You will bring me an account of it all when you come back,” she said on his ceasing to speak. “It’s not very clear to me whether I shall come back,” Robert returned. “I have a friend in Smyrna whom I shall go to see, and I shouldn’t wonder if I am tempted to stay out there.” “What, after all your perseverance in mastering English accomplishments?” “To tell you the truth, I don’t quite know what I shall do with myself if I stay here. Most probably I shall decide to go into harness again, one way or another. And that reminds me of the ‘Coach and Horses.’ I will wend my way to that respectable hostelry.” “You’ll come and breakfast in the morning?” “No; I must leave by the 8.15. I want to be early in London.” “You are rather an unreasonable man, my cousin Robert,” said Isabel, as she stood at leave-taking. “Because I am forced, with every expression of regret, to decline an invitation to a yachting expedition, you are more than half angry with me. I thought you and I were beyond these follies.” “Did you? But, you see, I am not a hardened giver of invitations. The occasion has a certain uniqueness for me.” “Take courage. If one whom you invite declines, there is always a better one very ready to fill the place.” Robert went his way, and before many days Isabel had a written “good-bye” from London: “To-morrow we start. It would have been a different thing if you had been with us here to-night. There are mysteries about you, cousin Isabel, and I rather think I was more at my ease before I began to puzzle over such things. If I settle in Smyrna, I will send you muscatels. Here or there, I believe I am always yours, Robert Asquith.” He never wrote a letter much longer than this. The day after his visit, Isabel took up her pen to talk with Kingcote.