you that, if you
marry, your wife--whoever she might be--would most probably want you to
give up flying? I cannot imagine a woman being able to bear that a man
who was her _all_, should do these things."

The Boy never turned a hair! He did not bound in his seat. He did not
even look at her.

"Why, of course, dear," he said, "if you wished it, I should give up
flying, like a shot, and sell my aeroplanes. I know plenty of chaps
who would like to buy them to-morrow. And I'll tell you what we would
do. We'd buy the biggest, most powerful motor-car we could get, and
we'd tear all over the country, exceeding the speed-limit, and doing
everything jolly we could think of. That would be every bit as good as
flying, if--if we did it together. I say, Christobel--do you know how
to make a sentence of 'together'? Just three words: _to get her_!
That's what 'together' spells for me now."

Miss Charteris smiled. "You might have taken honours in spelling, Boy.
And I am not the sort of person who enjoys exceeding speed-limits.
Also I am afraid I have a troublesome habit of always wanting to stop
and see all there is to see."

But the Boy was infinitely accommodating. "Oh, we wouldn't exceed the
speed-limit--much. And we would stop everywhere, and see everything.
You should breakfast in London; lunch at the Old White Horse, Mr.
Pickwick's inn at Ipswich; have tea at the Maid's Head, beneath the
shadow of Norwich Cathedral, where you could wash your hands in Queen
Elizabeth's fusty old bedroom--what a lot of bedrooms Queen Elizabeth
slept in, and made them all fusty--and have time to show me Little Boy
Blue's breakwater at Dovercourt, before dinner. There's nothing like
motoring!"

"It sounds interesting, certainly," said Miss Charteris.

"And then," continued the Boy, in a calm business-like voice, "it's
less expensive than flying. You run through fifty thousand a year in
no time with aeroplanes. And of course we should want to open both my
places. I'm awfully glad I didn't let the tenants in the old home
renew their lease. As it is, they turn out in three months. Oh, I
say, Christobel, I do believe it is a setting worthy of you. Have you
ever seen it? The great hall, the old pictures, the oak staircase--I
once rode down it on my rocking-horse and came to utter smash. And
outside--the park, the lake, the beech avenue, the rose-garden, the
peacocks. And a funny little old village belongs to us. Think how th