‘What a sigh, Geoffrey; and how thoughtful you look!’ exclaimed Jessie, who had an eye which marked every mote in the summer air. ‘Did I sigh? I may have eaten too much breakfast. Look here, Belle, you’d better let me take a pair of sculls, while you and Jessie dabble your hands in the water and talk of your last new dresses. It isn’t good for a man to be idle. I shall have the blues if I sit still and steer.’ ‘What a strange young man you are!’ said Belle. ‘Ten minutes ago you wanted to loll in a pony carriage and be driven.’ ‘I might have endured the pony carriage, but I can’t endure the boat unless I make myself useful. There, get in please, and sit down. What a toyshop affair! and as broad as a house! I should think the man who built Noah’s Ark must have designed this.’ The sisters exclaimed against this disparagement of their bark, which a local boatbuilder had adorned with all the devices of his art—cane-work, French polish and gilding, crimson damask-covered cushions, dainty cord and tassels—all those prettinesses which the Oxonian, who likes a boat that he can carry on his shoulder, regards with ineffable contempt. The stream was narrow but deep, and pleasantly sheltered, for the most part, with leafage; the banks clothed in beauty, and every turn of the river disclosing a new picture. But neither Geoffrey nor his companions gave themselves up to the contemplation of this ever-varying landscape. Geoffrey was thinking of Janet Bertram; the girls were wondering what made their cousin so silent. Mr. Hossack plied his sculls bravely, despite his abstraction, but even in this was actuated less by a desire to gratify his cousins than by a lurking design of his own. Six miles up this very stream lay Mardenholme, the mansion of the Bakers. Lady Baker’s famous gardens—gardens on which fabulous sums were annually lavished—sloped down to the brim of this very river. If he could row as far as Mardenholme, he might induce the girls to take him in to Lady Baker forthwith, and thus obtain the interview he sighed for. To hope for any confidential conversation with that lady on the day of a great garden party seemed foolish in the extreme; nor did it suit his impatient spirit to wait for the garden party. ‘When are these high-jinks to come off at Lady Baker’s?’ he inquired presently, in his most careless manner. ‘Next Tuesday. It’s to be such a swell party, Geoffrey—croquet, archery, a morning concert, a German tea, _tableaux vivants_, and a dance to wind up with.’ ‘_Tableaux vivants_,’ said Geoffrey with a yawn; ‘the Black Brunswicker and the Huguenot, I suppose. We have grown too æsthetic for the Juan and Haydee, and the Conrad and Medora of one’s youth. Are you two girls in the tableaux?’