"What a thing it is to have a practical maternal parent!" Thus Sally. And Mrs. Lobjoit put on record with an amiable smile that that is what she kept saying to Miss Nightingale, "Why not look?" Whereas the fact is Mrs. Lobjoit never said anything of the sort. "Here's a go!" says Sally, who gets at the label-side of the trunk first. "If it isn't Tishy!" And the mother and daughter look at each other's faces, each watching the other's theory forming of what this sudden apparition means. "What do you think, mother?" "What do _you_ think, kitten?" But the truth is, both wanted time to know what to think. And they hadn't got much forwarder with the solution of the problem when a light was thrown upon it by the sudden apparition of Laetitia herself, accompanied by the young gentleman whom Sally did not scruple to speak of--but not in his presence--as her counter-jumper. She did this, she said, to "pay Tishy out" for what she had said about him before she made his acquaintance. The couple were in a mixed state of exaltation and confusion--Tishy half laughing, a third crying, and a sixth keeping up her dignity. Both were saying might they come in, and doing it without waiting for an answer. Rosalind's remark was one of those nonsequences often met with in real life: "There's enough lunch--or we can send out." Sally's was: "But are you the Julius Bradshaws, or are you not? That's what _I_ want to know." Sally won't be trifled with, not she! "Well, Sally dear, no,--we're not--not just yet." Tishy hesitates. Julius shows firmness. "But we want to be at two o'clock this afternoon, if you'll come...." "Both of us?" "Why--of course, both of you." "Then Mrs. Lobjoit will have to be in time with lunch." It does not really matter who were the speakers, nor what the share of each was in the following aggregate: "How did you manage to get it arranged?" "Why _now_? Have you quarrelled with your mother?" "How long can you be away? I hate a stingy honeymoon!" "You've got no things." "Do you think they'll know at home where you are?" "Where are you going afterwards?" "What do you think your father will say?" "What I want to know is, what put it into your head _now_, more than any other time?" Responses to the whole of which, much at random, are incorporated in what follows: "Julius isn't wanted for three weeks." "I'm sure the Professor's on our side, really." "I left a letter to tell them, anyhow." "Calais. We shan't be sick, in weather like this. We'll cross by the night boat." "I've got a new dress to be married in, and a new umbrella--oh yes, and other things." "I'll tell you the whole story, Sally dear, as soon as I've had time to turn round." "No--not quarrelled--at least, no more than usual." "Special licence, of course."