“Well, send for her if you get into any troubles while I am away.  I shall feel quite brave about her being here, when I am safely hidden in the long grass!”

“Is there any possible chance that you will get back sooner than you think, Ronnie?”

“Hardly.  Not before November, anyway.  And yesterday my publishers were keen that I should put in a night at Leipzig on my way home, and a night at the Hague; show whatever ‘copy’ I have to firms there, and make arrangements for German and Dutch translations to appear as soon as possible after the English edition is out.  I think I may as well do this, and return by the Hook of Holland.  I enjoy the night-crossing, and like reaching London early in the morning.  By the way, haven’t you a cousin of some sort living at Leipzig?”

“Yes; my first cousin, Aubrey Treherne.  He is studying music, and working on compositions of his own, I believe.  He lives in a flat in the Grassi Strasse.”

“All right.  Put his address in my pocket-book.  I will look him up.  My special chum, Dick Cameron, is to be out there in November, investigating one of their queer water-cures.  I wish you knew Dick Cameron, Helen.  I shall hope to see him, too.  Has your cousin a spare room in his flat?”

“I do not know.  Ronnie, Aubrey Treherne is not a good man.  He is not a man you should trust.”

“Darling, you don’t necessarily trust a fellow because he puts you up for the night.  But I daresay Dick will find me a room.”

“Aubrey is not a good man,” repeated Helen firmly.

“Dear, we are none of us good.”

“You are, Ronnie—­in the sense I mean, or I should not have married you.”

“Oh, then, yes please!” said Ronnie.  “I am very, very good!”

He laughed up at her, but Helen’s face was grave.  Then a sudden thought brightened it.

“If you really go to Leipzig, Ronnie, could you look in at Zimmermann’s—­a first-rate place for musical instruments of all kinds—­and choose me a small organ for the new church?  I saw a little beauty the other day at Huntingford; a perfect tone, twelve stops, and quite easy to play.  They had had it sent over from Leipzig.  It cost only twenty-four pounds.  In England, one could hardly have bought so good an instrument for less than forty.  If you could choose one with a really sweet tone, and have it shipped over here, I should be grateful.”

“With pleasure, darling.  I enjoy trying all sorts of instruments.  But why economise over the organ?  If my wife fancied a hundred guinea organ, I could give it her.”

“No, you couldn’t, Ronnie.  You must not be extravagant.”

“I am not extravagant, dear.  Buying things one can afford is not extravagance.”

“Sometimes it is.  Extravagance is not spending money.  But it is paying a higher price for a thing than the actual need demands, or than the circumstances justify.  I considered you extravagant last winter when you paid five guineas for a box at Olympia, intended to hold eight people, and sat in it, in solitary grandeur, alone with your wife.”