When Jim Airth left the train on the following Tuesday afternoon, he looked eagerly up and down the platform, hoping to see Myra. True, they had particularly arranged not to meet, until after his interview with Lady Ingleby. But Myra was so charmingly inconsequent and impulsive in her actions. It would be quite like her to reverse the whole plan they had made; and, if her desire to see him, in any measure resembled his huge hunger for a sight of her, he could easily understand such a reversal.

However, Myra was not there; and with a heavy sense of unreasonable disappointment, Jim Airth chucked his ticket to a waiting porter, passed through the little station, and found a smart turn-out, with tandem ponies, waiting outside.

The groom at the leader’s head touched his hat.

“For Shenstone Park, sir?”

“Yes,” said Jim Airth, and climbed in.

The groom touched his hat again. “Her ladyship said, sir, that perhaps you might like to drive the ponies yourself, sir.”

“No, thank you,” said Jim Airth, shortly. “I never drive other people’s ponies.”

The groom’s comprehending grin was immediately suppressed. He touched his hat again; gathered up the reins, mounted the driver’s seat, flicked the leader, and the perfectly matched ponies swung at once into a fast trot.

Jim Airth, a connoisseur in horse-flesh, eyed them with approval. They flew along the narrow Surrey lanes, between masses of wild roses and clematis. The villagers were working in the hayfields, shouting gaily to one another as they tossed the hay. It was a matchless June day, in a perfect English summer.

Jim Airth’s disappointment at Myra’s non-appearance, was lifting rapidly in the enjoyment of the drive. After all it was best to adhere to plans once made; and every step of these jolly little tapping hoofs was bringing him nearer to the Lodge. Perhaps she would be at the window. (He had particularly told her not to be!)

“These ponies have been well handled,” he remarked approvingly to the groom, as they flew round a bend.

“Yes, sir,” said the groom, with the inevitable movement towards his hat, whip and hand going up together. “Her ladyship always drives them herself, sir. Fine whip, her ladyship, sir.”

This item of information surprised Jim Airth. Judging by Lord Ingleby’s age and appearance, he had expected to find Lady Ingleby a sedate and stately matron of sixty. It was somewhat surprising to hear of her as a fine whip.

However, he had no time to weigh the matter further. Passing an ivy-clad church on the village green, they swung through massive iron gates, of very fine design, and entered the stately avenue of Shenstone Park. To the left, in a group of trees, stood a pretty little gabled house.

“What house is that?” asked Jim Airth, quickly.

“The Lodge, sir.”

“Who lives there?”

“Mrs. O’Mara, sir.”

“Has Mrs. O’Mara returned?”

“I don’t know, sir. She was up at the house with her ladyship this morning.”

“Then she has returned,” said Jim Airth.

The groom looked perplexed, but made no comment.

Jim Airth turned in his seat, and looked back at the Lodge. It was a far smaller house than he had expected. This fact did not seem to depress him. He smiled to himself, as at some thought which gave him amusement and pleasure. While he still looked back, a side door opened; a neatly dressed woman in black, apparently a superior lady’s-maid, appeared on the doorstep, shook out a white table-cloth, and re-entered the house.

They flew on up the avenue, Jim Airth noting every tree with appreciation and pleasure. The fine old house came into view, and a moment later they drew up at the entrance.

“Good driving,” remarked Jim Airth approvingly, as he tipped the little groom. Then he turned, to find the great doors already standing wide, and a stately butler, with immense black eyebrows, waiting to receive him.

“Will you come to her ladyship’s sitting-room, sir?” said the butler, and led the way.

Jim Airth entered a charmingly appointed room, and looked around.

It was empty.

“Kindly wait here, sir, while I acquaint her ladyship with your arrival,” said the pompous person with the eyebrows, and went out noiselessly, closing the door behind him.

Left alone, Jim Airth commenced taking rapid note of the room, hoping to gain therefrom some ideas as to the tastes and character of its possessor. But almost immediately his attention was arrested by a life-size portrait of Lord Ingleby, hanging above the mantelpiece.

Jim Airth walked over to the hearthrug, and stood long, looking with silent intentness at the picture.

“Excellent,” he said to himself, at last. “Extraordinarily clever. That chap shall paint Myra, if I can lay hands on him. What a jolly little dog! And what devotion! Mutual and absorbing. I suppose that is Peter. Queer to think that I should have been the last to hear him calling Peter. I wonder whether Lady Ingleby liked Peter. If not, I doubt if she would have had much of a look-in. If anyone went to the wall it certainly wasn’t Peter.”

He was still absorbed in the picture, when the butler returned with a long message, solemnly delivered.

“Her ladyship is out in the grounds, sir. As it is so warm in the house, sir, her ladyship requests that you come to her in the grounds. If you will allow me, sir, I will show you the way.”

Jim Airth restrained an inclination to say: “Buck up!” and followed the butler along a corridor, down a wide staircase to a lower hall. They stepped out on to a terrace running the full length of the house. Below it, an old-fashioned garden, with box borders, bright flower beds, a fountain in the centre. Beyond this a smooth lawn, sloping down to a beautiful lake, which sparkled and gleamed in the afternoon sunshine. On this lawn, well to the right, half-way between the house and the water, stood a group of beeches. Beneath their spreading boughs, in the cool inviting shadow, were some garden chairs. Jim Airth could just discern, in one of these, the white gown of a woman, holding a scarlet parasol.

The butler indicated this clump of trees.

“Her ladyship said, sir, that she would await you under the beeches.”

He returned to the house, and Jim Airth was left to make his way alone to Lady Ingleby, guided by the gleam among the trees of her brilliant parasol. Even at that moment it gave him pleasure to find Lady Ingleby’s taste in sunshades, resembling Myra’s.

He stood for a minute on the terrace, taking in the matchless beauty of the place. Then his face grew sad and stern. “What a home to leave,” he said; “and to leave it, never to return!”

He still wore a look of sadness as he descended the steps leading to the flower garden, made his way along the narrow gravel paths; then stepped on to the soft turf of the lawn, and walked towards the clump of beeches.

Jim Airth—tall and soldierly, broad-shouldered and erect—might have made an excellent impression upon Lady Ingleby, had she watched his coming. But she kept her parasol between herself and her approaching guest.

In fact he drew quite near; near enough to distinguish the ripples of soft lace about, her feet, the long graceful sweep of her gown; and still she seemed unconscious of his close proximity.

He passed beneath the beeches and stood before her. And, even then, the parasol concealed her face.

But Jim Airth was never at a loss, when sure of his ground. “Lady Ingleby,” he said, with grave formality; “I was told to——”

Then the parasol was flung aside, and he found himself looking down into the lovely laughing eyes of Myra.

To see Jim Airth’s face change from its look of formal gravity to one of rapturous delight, was to Myra well worth the long effort of sitting immovable. He flung himself down before her with boyish abandon, and clasped both herself and her chair in his long arms.

“Oh, you darling!” he said, bending his face over hers, while his blue eyes danced with delight. “Oh, Myra, what centuries since yesterday! How I have longed for you. I almost hoped you would after all have come to the station. How I have grudged wasting all this time in coming to call on old Lady Ingleby. Myra, has it seemed long to you? Do you realise, my dear girl, that it can’t go on any longer; that we cannot possibly live through another twenty-four hours of separation? But oh, you Tease! There was I, ramping with impatience at every wasted moment; and here were you, sitting under this tree, hiding your face and pretending to be Lady Ingleby! The astonished and astonishing old party in the eyebrows, certainly pointed you out as Lady Ingleby when he started me off on my pilgrimage. I say, how lovely you look! What billowy softness! It wouldn’t do for cliff-climbing; but its A.I. for sitting on lawns.... I can’t help it! I must!”

“Jim,” said Myra, laughing and pushing him away; “what has come to you, you dearest old boy? You will really have to behave! We are not in the honeysuckle arbour. ‘The astonishing old party in the eyebrows’ is most likely observing us from a window, and will have good cause to look astonished, if he sees you ‘carrying on’ in such a manner. Jim, how nice you look in your town clothes. I always like a grey frock-coat. Stand up, and let me see.... Oh, look at the green of the turf on those immaculate knees! What a pity. Did you don all this finery for me?”

“Of course not, silly!” said Jim Airth, rubbing his knees vigorously. “When I haul you up cliffs, I wear old Norfolk coats; and when I duck you in the sea, I wear flannels. I considered this the correct attire in which to pay a formal call on Lady Ingleby; and now, before she has had a chance of being duly impressed by it, I have spoilt my knees hopelessly, worshipping at your shrine! Where is Lady Ingleby? Why doesn’t she keep her appointments?”

“Jim,” said Myra, looking up at him with eyes full of unspeakable love, yet dancing with excitement and delight; “Jim, do you admire this place?”

“This place?” cried Jim, stepping back a pace, so as to command a good view of the lake and woods beyond. “It is absolutely perfect. We have nothing like this in Scotland. You can’t beat for all round beauty a real old mellow lived-in English country seat; especially when you get a twenty acre lake, with islands and swans, all complete. And I suppose the woods beyond, as far as one can see, belong to the Inglebys—or rather, to Lady Ingleby. What a pity there is no son.”

“Jim,” said Myra, “I have so looked forward to showing you my home.”

He stepped close to her at once. “Then show it to me, dear,” he said. “I would rather be alone with you in your own little home—I saw it, as we drove up—than waiting about, in this vast expanse of beauty, for Lady Ingleby.”

“Jim,” said Myra, “do you remember a little tune I often hummed down in Cornwall; and, when you asked me what it was, I said you should hear the words some day?”

Jim looked puzzled. “Really dear—you hummed so many little tunes——”

“Oh, I know,” said Myra; “and I have not much ear. But this was very special. I want to sing it to you now. Listen!”

And looking up at him, her soft eyes full of love, Myra sang, with slight alterations of her own, the last verse of the old Scotch ballad, “Huntingtower.”

“Very pretty,” said Jim, “but you’ve mixed it, my dear. Jamie bestowed all his possessions on the lassie. You sang it the wrong way round.”

“No, no,” cried Myra, eagerly. “There is no wrong way round. Providing they both love, it does not really matter which gives. The one who happens to possess, bestows. If you were a cowboy, Jim, and you loved a woman with lands and houses, in taking her, you would take all that was hers.”

“I guess I’d take her out to my ranch and teach her to milk cows,” laughed Jim Airth. Then turning about under the tree and looking in all directions: “But seriously, Myra, where is Lady Ingleby? She should keep her appointments. We cannot waste our whole afternoon waiting here. I want my girl; and I want her in her own little home, alone. Cannot we find Lady Ingleby?”

Then Myra rose, radiant, and came and stood before him. The sunbeams shone through the beech leaves and danced in her grey eyes. She had never looked more perfect in her sweet loveliness. The man took it all in, and the glory of possession lighted his handsome face.

She came and stood before him, laying her hands upon his breast. He wrapped his arms lightly about her. He saw she had something to say; and he waited.

“Jim,” said Myra, “Jim, dearest. There is just one name I want to bear, more than any other. There is just one thing I long to be. Then I shall be content. I want to have the right to be called ‘Mrs. Jim Airth.’ I want more than all else beside, to be your wife. But—until I am that; and may it be very soon! until you make me ‘Mrs. Jim Airth’—dearest—I—am Lady Ingleby.”