‘But what would you do?’

‘I’d stick to it like wax till they did something for me.’

‘There’s nothing to stick to.’

’I’d take it for granted I was going at once to Sydney.  I’d get my outfit, and, by George!  I’d take my place.’

‘I’ve told Sir John I wasn’t going; and he said it wasn’t necessary.’  As Bagwax told his sad tale he almost wept.

’I wouldn’t mind that.  I’d have it out of them somehow.  Why is he to have all the pay?  No doubt it’s been hundreds to him; and you’ve done the work and got nothing.’

’When I asked him to get me sent, he said he’d no power;—­not now it’s all so plain.’  He turned his face down towards the desk to hide the tear that now was, in truth, running down his face.  ‘But duty!’ he said, looking up again.  ’Duty!  England expects——.  D—­n it, who’s going to whimper?  When I lay my head on my pillow at night and think that I, I, Thomas Bagwax, have restored that nameless one to her babe and her lord, I shall sleep even though that pillow be no better than a hard bolster.’

‘Jemima will look after that,’ said the father, laughing.  ’But still I wouldn’t give it up.  Never give a chance up,—­they come so seldom.  I’ll tell you what I should do;—­I should apply to the Secretary for leave to go to Sydney at once.’

‘At my own expense?’ said Bagwax, horrified.

’Certainly not;—­but that you might have an opportunity of investigating all this for the public service.  It’ll get referred round in some way to the Secretary of State, who can’t but say all that you’ve done.  When it gets out of a man’s own office he don’t so much mind doing a little job.  It sounds good-natured.  And then if they don’t do anything for you, you’ll get a grievance.  Next to a sum of money down, a grievance is the best thing you can have.  A man who can stick to a grievance year after year will always make money of it at last.’

On the Saturday, Bagwax went down to Apricot Lodge, having been invited to stay with his beloved till the Monday.  In the smiles of his beloved he did find much consolation, especially as it had already been assured to him that sixty pounds a-year would be settled on Jemima on and from her wedding-day.  And then they made very much of him.  ’You do love me, Tom; don’t you?’ said Jemima.  They were sitting on camp-stools behind the grotto, and Bagwax answered by pressing the loved one’s waist.  ‘Better than going to Sydney, Tom,—­don’t you?’

‘It is so very different,’ said Bagwax,—­which was true.

’If you don’t like me better than anything else in all the world, however different, I will never stand at the altar with you.’  And she moved her camp-stool perhaps an inch away.

‘In the way of loving, of course I do.’

‘Then why do you grieve when you’ve got what you like best?’

‘You don’t understand, Jemima, what a spirit of adventure means.’

’I think I do, or I shouldn’t be going to marry you.  That’s quite as great an adventure as a journey to Sydney.  You ought to be very glad to get off, now you’re going to settle down as a married man.’