Karl, by reason of the nearing end of the Midsummer Term, must return to Oxford that night, so it was interesting to note how much he made of those flying hours of freedom. At least a year a minute fell away from the conventional coating of the decade which had sped since he and the girl were children together. “Mr. Grier,” and “Miss Hutchinson” quickly gave place to “Karl” and “Maggie.” We were not at Barnes Bridge on the outward journey before Karl had declared his fixed resolution to wheedle a motor-car out of his father the day he quitted the University, and the pair of them were planning where “we” should drive this chariot of delight during the wonderful summer of next year! Maggie, it appeared, was much enamored of cathedrals. Here was a fine inspiration to provide excursions for long summer days! Bless you, they had seen Canterbury, Salisbury and Ely in a sentence, and were doing sums in the following breath to find out if far-away York were achievable. Ah, how potent the engineer who constructs that magic machine which carries the day-dreams of the young! What feats it accomplishes, how smoothly do its noiseless wheels glide over the most perfect of roads! Yet we all possess the treasure, and happy the man or woman who has not lost the joy of living, losing with it the willing slave which carries them whither they list. This wonder-coach is capable of astounding performances. It shall whisk you through many cities and strange lands. What does it matter if the scene be new to your eyes when you are brought to it by the sober stuffiness of a railway plus a return ticket? You have been there twice, that is all, and surely the first visit, in imagination, far surpassed the second, in reality. Indeed, we enjoyed ourselves so greatly that the crassness of things in general was sure to bring about some unpleasantness. There is a substratum of truth in the old Celtic idea of certain people being fey before death. None of us died, I am glad to say, but we should have been wise had we outrageously made off with that motor-car, scurrying far from London ere nightfall, and leaving it to my ingenuity to explain matters to my lending friend. We reached the hotel at six o’clock, and there was Signor Bocci impatiently awaiting the return of Mrs. Hutchinson and her violin-playing daughter. “Business is business,” you know, and really I could see no reason why the girl should not accept the splendid offer made by Steindal’s agent. He showed no disinclination to discuss it before Karl and me. Nay more, the little man said he was glad of our presence. “You are-a men of affairs, yes,” he said volubly, “and in-a dis oafer I haf-a displayed to de signorina de career mos’ magnificent, is it-a not?”