“I have never tasted it before. No doubt I should like it in time.” “Well, you must make a beginning. Why not start to educate your taste now? Do, please!” Pretty Jessie Patterson’s bright face shone with her sunny, boyish smile. “Why, how earnest you are!” she laughed. “I had no idea you were so polite, Professor Mercer. Even if I do not eat it I am just as grateful.” “You are foolish not to eat it,” said the Professor, with such intensity that the smile died from her face and her eyes reflected the earnestness of his own. “I tell you it is foolish not to eat caviare to-night.” “But why—why?” she asked. “Because you have it on your plate. Because it is sinful to waste it.” “There! there!” said stout Mrs. Patterson, leaning across. “Don’t trouble her any more. I can see that she does not like it. But it shall not be wasted.” She passed the blade of her knife under it, and scraped it from Jessie’s plate on to her own. “Now it won’t be wasted. Your mind will be at ease, Professor.” But it did not seem at ease. On the contrary, his face was agitated like that of a man who encounters an unexpected and formidable obstacle. He was lost in thought. The conversation buzzed cheerily. Everyone was full of his future plans. “No, no, there is no holiday for me,” said Father Pierre. “We priests don’t get holidays. Now that the mission and school are formed I am to leave it to Father Amiel, and to push westwards to found another.” “You are leaving?” said Mr. Patterson. “You don’t mean that you are going away from Ichau?” Father Pierre shook his venerable head in waggish reproof. “You must not look so pleased, Mr. Patterson.” “Well, well, our views are very different,” said the Presbyterian, “but there is no personal feeling towards you, Father Pierre. At the same time, how any reasonable educated man at this time of the world’s history can teach these poor benighted heathen that——” A general buzz of remonstrance silenced the theology. “What will you do yourself, Mr. Patterson?” asked someone. “Well, I’ll take three months in Edinburgh to attend the annual meeting. You’ll be glad to do some shopping in Princes Street, I’m thinking, Mary. And you, Jessie, you’ll see some folk your own age. Then we can come back in the fall, when your nerves have had a rest.” “Indeed, we shall all need it,” said Miss Sinclair, the mission nurse. “You know, this long strain takes me in the strangest way. At the present moment I can hear such a buzzing in my ears.” “Well, that’s funny, for it’s just the same with me,” cried Ainslie. “An absurd up-and-down buzzing, as if a drunken bluebottle were trying experiments on his register. As you say, it must be due to nervous strain. For my part I am going back to Peking, and I hope I may get some promotion over this affair. I can get good polo here, and that’s as fine a change of thought as I know. How about you, Ralston?”