"Well, it can’t be helped," said Geordie, "and I don’t know that I’m sorry. She’d have proposed if I’d kept her at the second speed, I know that; so perhaps I’m well out of it." He whirled after Bob and his lady, and soon caught them up. There was peace on that car, too, for Bob hadn’t been able to keep his discovery to himself. "Yes, you’re right, Bob," sighed Penelope. "But what could I do after what I’d said? And what can I do now?" "Cheer up!" said Bob. "I’ll fix it for you somehow. Do you know, Pen, I begin to think that after all women aren’t as difficult to understand as Baker says." They came to Upwell in the early afternoon, and were ignorant that the world was on their track. Bob sent a telegram to "Mr. Bramwell" as soon as they got there. *CHAPTER XXVII.* The bishop was excited. There is no doubt about it. Nor is it any wonder, for the sporting element exists even on the episcopal bench, and the hunting of Penelope was peculiar and choice sport. The clergy of his diocese were moderately tame, and when he pointed his episcopal gun at them, they said they would come down, just as the celebrated squirrel did when Colonel Crockett raised his weapon. Not for a long time had he felt so pleased with himself. He was quite certain that Penelope was to be run to earth in the neighbourhood of Spilsby, and, when he had found her, he proposed to speak to her like a father. "I shall certainly suggest a religious ceremony in the cathedral," he said, blandly. "Oh, yes, I shall insist on it." "You’ll do what?" asked Bradstock, who was with him and the duchess in the early train to Spilsby. "You’ll do what?" The bishop rubbed his hands. "As the one who christened her, I shall insist on a religious ceremony," he replied. "Will you?" asked Bradstock. "To be sure I shall," said the bishop. "Did you ever hear of Mrs. Partington?" asked Bradstock, "or of King Canute, or of any other celebrated character in history or fiction whose insistence did not come off?" "I scarcely understand you, Bradstock," said the bishop, with dignity. "I can hardly imagine that you mean to hint, not altogether obscurely, that Lady Penelope will treat any suggestion of mine with disrespect." Bradstock intimated that that was what he did mean, and Titania, who had got up too early and felt like it, said that she expected nothing from Penelope now but the worst.