That afternoon, as soon as I had gulped down a choking lunch, I bolted down to the Parks and saw Annie. At first I thought it was a hopeless task to convince her that Ida Van Rensselaer's conduct was, from an American point of view, nothing extraordinary. She persisted in declaring that such goings-on were not respectable, and that I was bound, as an officer of the University, to remove the young woman at once from the eight-mile radius over which my jurisdiction extended. I pleaded in vain that ladies in America always travelled alone, and that nobody thought anything of it. Annie pertinently remarked that that would be excellent logic in New York, but that it was quite un-Aristotelian in Oxford. "When your American friends come to Rome," she said coldly--as though I were in the habit of importing Yankee girls wholesale--"they must do as Rome does." But when I at last pointed out that Ida, as an American citizen, could appeal to her minister if I attempted to turn her out, and that we might find ourselves the centre of an international quarrel--possibly even a _casus belli_--she finally yielded with a struggle. "For the sake of respectability," she said solemnly, "I'll go and call on this girl with you; but remember, Cyril, I shall never undertake to help you out of such a disgraceful scrape a second time." I sneaked out into the garden to wait for her, and felt that the burden of a Proctorship was really more than I could endure. We called duly upon Ida, that very hour, and Ida certainly behaved herself remarkably well. She was so charmingly frank and pretty, she apologized so simply to Annie for her ignorance of English etiquette, and she was so obviously guileless and innocent-hearted in all her talk, that even Annie herself--who is, I must confess, a typical don's wife--was gradually mollified. To my great surprise, Annie even asked her to dinner _en famille_ the same evening, and suggested that I should make an arrangement with the Junior Proctor to take my work, and join the party. I consented, not without serious misgivings; but I felt that if Ida was really going to stop a week, it would be well to put the best face upon it, and to show her up in company with Annie as often as possible. That might just conceivably take the edge off the keen blade of University scandal.