Then there was his South-African trip.  He was sent there by a London firm, to expert a mine near Johannesburg.  Although he cabled five times, said firm sent no money.  The bitter disgust and anguish of those weeks—­neither of us ever had much patience under such circumstances.  But he experted his mine, and found it absolutely worthless; explored the veldt on a second-hand bicycle, cooked little meals of bacon and mush wherever he found himself, and wrote to me.  Meanwhile he learned much, studied the coolie question, investigated mine-workings, was entertained by his old college mates—­mining experts themselves—­in Johannesburg.  There was the letter telling of the bull fight at Zanzibar, or Delagoa Bay, or some seafaring port thereabouts, that broke his heart, it was such a disappointment—­“it made a Kappa tea look gory by comparison.”  And the letter that regretfully admitted that perhaps, after all, Persia would not just do to settle down in.  About that time he wanted California with a fearful want, and was all done with foreign parts, and declared that any place just big enough for two suited him—­it did not need to be as far away as Persia after all.  At last he borrowed money to get back to Europe, claiming that “he had learned his lesson and learned it hard.”  And finally he came home as fast as ever he could reach Berkeley—­did not stop even to telegraph.

I had planned for months a dress I knew he would love to have me greet him in.  It was hanging ready in the closet.  As it was, I had started to retire—­in the same room with a Freshman whom I was supposed to be “rushing” hard—­when I heard a soft whistle—­our whistle—­under my window.  My heart stopped beating.  I just grabbed a raincoat and threw it over me, my hair down in a braid, and in the middle of a sentence to the astounded Freshman I dashed out.

My father had said, “If neither of you changes your mind while Carl is away, I have no objection to your becoming engaged.”  In about ten minutes after his return we were formally engaged, on a bench up in the Deaf and Dumb Asylum grounds—­our favorite trysting-place.  It would have been foolish to waste a new dress on that night.  I was clad in cloth of gold for all Carl knew or cared, or could see in the dark, for that matter.  The deserted Freshman was sound asleep when I got back—­and joined another sorority.

Thereafter, for a time, Carl went into University Extension, lecturing on Trade-Unionism and South Africa.  It did not please him altogether, and finally my father, a lawyer himself, persuaded him to go into law.  Carl Parker in law!  How we used to shudder at it afterwards; but it was just one more broadening experience that he got out of life.