"Well, the native ladies don't wear much, and the ladies of the missions wear much what you would here, if you cared only for use and comfort, and nothing for fashion. They always look very neat and clean"--at which Jean smiled reminiscently. "I see," said Aunt Jannet. "Jean and I will lay our heads together. I think we can live up to that standard, at all events." He had a cup of tea with them, and then ran along to the hotel to bring old Mr. and Mrs. MacTavish over to dinner. And after dinner they sat and talked and talked, and he laid some of his ideas and plans before them, and had only just begun when it was time for the old people to go home to bed. For his plans and ideas were blossoming in the golden sunshine like an orchard kept back by a late spring, and flung suddenly into the quickening warmth of coming summer. He had gone down that morning to see the secretary of the Society which had originally sent him out, and to whom he still felt officially bound, to inform him of the changes in his plans which his marriage would bring about, and to request an extension of leave. There happened to be a full meeting of the committee in session when his name was brought in, and the secretary at once suggested his introduction to the meeting. And so, when Blair was shown into the board-room, expecting to meet Mr. Secretary alone, he found some fifty ladies and gentlemen eagerly awaiting him. The great glad light in his face--the light that Jean Arnot had helped to rekindle--drew all their eyes. They whispered among themselves that the Queen's Hall meeting had done him good after all. Some of them had been fearing the effects of such tremendous emotion on a weakened body. The chairman, the noble head of a house devoted to good deeds, gave him hearty welcome, and said the committee would be delighted to hear any further details he would like to give them of his work or future plans in the Dark Islands. Blair jumped up as the old man sat down. "I came, sir," he said, "on a very definite errand--to ask for a slight extension of my stay here." "It is granted, my dear sir, before you put any limit to it," said the old man cordially. "Every member of this committee feels, I am sure, that the matter may be safely left in your own hands. We know also that you are anxious to get back to your work. I will only express the hope that it is not through any relapse in health that you think it necessary." It certainly did not look like it, as Blair, with a smile that would not be controlled, said-- "I am glad to say it is not a matter touching my health, though one that very intimately affects my happiness and well-being. Since that somewhat trying meeting in Queen's Hall a piece of very great good-fortune has come to me----" "Good indeed to set such a light in his face!" thought they, and hung upon his words. "Miss Arnot has consented to become my wife and to join me in the work out there."