ay of
arranging matters, and it was certainly less trouble to be entertained
and directed hither and thither than to take the initiative and
entertain. At any rate it was a change.

But bicycles, like donkeys, are not always satisfactory means of
locomotion. The pair had not gone much further when Gertrude's tyre
punctured, and a halt was called while Cecil repaired it.

Cecil was not a good workman; he made a long job of it, and when at
last they started again, time was getting on and they had but reached
a small colony of houses when Gertrude exclaimed that her tyre was
down again.

She glanced round at the little cluster of houses. "There's a cycle
shop," she said, "and a tea shop next door. How convenient. We had
better have the punctured tyre mended for us and we can have tea while
we wait!"

Cecil obediently wheeled her cycle into one shop and followed her into
the second.

He found her seated at a little table, examining the watch on her
wrist.

"Guess what the time is," she said laughing. "Let us hope they won't
wait tea for us at the Landslip, for I am sure we shall never get
there! The woman here says there is no way of getting there except by
going back to the cross-road!"

Cecil looked rather blank. He had not at all counted on failing to
keep the appointment at the cottage, or on running the risk of thereby
offending Mrs. Henchman, and where would be his promise to himself of
making it up to Audrey at tea-time?

However, the tea was already being placed on the table, a plate of
cakes was at his elbow, and Gertrude was asking if he took milk and
sugar.

He shrugged his shoulders mentally. "In for a penny, in for a pound,"
he said to himself, "here I am and I may as well enjoy myself."

So while Denys waited and watched for them in the Landslip cottage,
these two laughed and ate and chatted and at last mounted their
bicycles and rode off back to Whitecliff in a leisurely manner,
arriving five minutes after Audrey, dressed in her very best white
frock, had departed to her breaking-up school concert, leaving Denys
to hastily change her dress, eat a much-needed tea and rush up to the
station to meet Charlie.

Gertrude came in with her usual easy manner.

"Well!" she said, "here we are! Where is everybody? Did you think we
were lost?"

"I am awfully sorry we missed," said Cecil quickly. "The fact is we
got into a road that did not go there at all, and then Miss Gertrude
had a puncture, and the