"Miss Krige does me an injustice," Matheson protested. "The mines lured me only for a brief while. Engineering is my profession. I go back to it when I leave here." "So!" remarked Oom Koos, and smoked reflectively. "Do you make a long stay at Benfontein?" he asked. "I have made a long stay," Matheson answered. "I leave to-morrow, if that is convenient to Mrs Krige." "To-morrow, eh? I am going by De Aar to-morrow. If it suits you, I will be very pleased to drive you." This arrangement was so entirely convenient, and so satisfactory in that it fixed the day and settled definitely the time for his departure, that Matheson's reluctant acceptance of the kindly intentioned offer sounded somewhat ungracious even in his own ears. He was amazed at himself. Here was an offer which exactly suited his plans, and which relieved the Kriges of the necessity of driving him into town, and he felt resentful at having to avail himself of it. At the back of his mind had loomed the hope that Honor would drive with him to De Aar. For some reason of her own Honor appeared equally dissatisfied with the arrangement. She listened to Matheson's halting acceptance, and to her mother's mildly uttered protest against this sudden departure, with thinly disguised impatience, breaking in on Mrs Krige's expressions of regret. "It all depends on what hour you start, Oom Koos. Mr Matheson has an engagement to ride with me to-morrow morning," she announced. "Certainly. I am not forgetting that," Matheson said promptly. Oom Koos looked from one to the other and smoked deliberately and smiled. "Mijn Maachtij!" He delivered himself of a deep breath. "I have been young myself, Honor. When you release Mr Matheson I will drive him to the town. That shall not interfere with your pleasure." Inexplicably, now that his departure was definitely fixed, though the responsibility for its settlement was his, Matheson chafed at the thought of going, and felt quite unjustly aggrieved with the worthy Dutchman's amiable endeavour to suit his convenience. He considered Oom Koos officious. And then he fell to blaming Honor. Why had she not attempted to dissuade him that morning? Why had she taken the announcement of his departure so calmly, showing an indifference that seemed to indicate that his going affected her no more than the going of any other chance visitor? Simply she had appeared not to care; and that hurt him. Bidding good-bye to her would not, he knew, be an easy matter for him. It would have consoled him somewhat to know that it would not have left her unaffected. He had a persuasion that though he was leaving Benfontein it would not be for ever: some day he would travel again in that direction; and the next time he came it would not be on another man's business.