She offered him the pink topaz to admire, and he bowed his head, conveying that faint mockery with which he treated anything that was not a flower. "Very fine. Very fine, my dear." "Well, aren't you going to congratulate me?" Pauline asked. "On what?" "Oh, Father, you are naughty. On Guy, of course." "Bless my heart," said the Rector. "And on what am I to congratulate him?" "On me, of course," said Pauline. "Now I wonder if I can honestly do that?" said the Rector, very seriously. "Father, you do realize, don't you, because you are being so naughty, but you do realize that from to-day we are really engaged?" "Only from to-day?" the Rector asked, a twinkle in his eye. "Well, of course," Pauline explained, "we've been in love for very nearly a year." "And when have you decided to get married?" Pauline looked at Guy. "We thought in about two years, sir," said Guy. "That is, of course, as soon as I've published my first book. Perhaps in a year, really." "Just when you find it convenient, in fact," said the Rector, still twinkling. "Well, Father," Pauline interrupted, "have we got your permission? Because that's what we've come up to ask." "You surprise me," said the Rector, starting back with an exaggerated look of astonishment such as one might use with children. "Father, if you won't be serious about it, I shall be very much hurt." "I am very serious indeed about it," said the Rector. "And supposing I said I wouldn't hear of any such thing as an engagement between you two young creatures, what would you say then?" "Oh, I should never forgive you," Pauline declared. "Besides, we're not young. Guy is twenty-three." "Now I thought he was at least fifty," said the Rector. "Father, we shall have to go away if you won't be serious. Mother told us to explain to you, and I think it's really unkind of you to laugh at us." The Rector rose and knocked his pipe out. "I must finish off the perennials. Well, well, Pauline, my dear, you're twenty-one...." Pauline would have liked to let him go on thinking she was of age, but she could not on this solemn occasion, and so she told him that she was still only twenty. "Ah, that makes a difference," said the Rector, pretending to look very fierce. And when Pauline's face fell he added, with a chuckle, "of one year. Well, well, I fancy you've both arranged everything. What is there left for me to say? You mustn't forget to show Guy those Nerines. God bless you, pretty babies. Be happy." Then the Rector walked quickly away and left them together in his dusty library where the botanical folios and quartos displaying tropic blooms sprawled open about the floor, where along the mantelpiece the rhizomes of _Oncocyclus irises_ were being dried; and where seeds were strewn plenteously on his desk, rattling among the papers whenever the wind blew. "Guy, we are really engaged." "Pauline, Pauline!"