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When Tony had conducted the Marchmonts to Calais and the three months’ tour was over, he politely declined to go back to England with them. Madame would excuse him, he said, but he had friends in France whom he felt he must see. Mrs. Marchmont, tight-gowned and kindly, was sorry, but she quite understood.

“I hope you’ll find all right at home—all right again,” she repeated with emphasis. “And mind, Ste. Croix, if you want to come back to us any time, you write to me an’ I’ll see if it can be managed. But perhaps you won’t be chauffing any more.”

Tony said he was grateful, which was true, but he never went back to the Marchmonts again. For the next two years he wandered about Europe, chiefly in the South—Spain, Italy, Greece, Dalmatia—working at whatever came to hand, and spending very little; sometimes mixing in quite decent society, sometimes finding much of interest in the reverse. His adventures were many, and as to the work, now almost for the first time he found his youth a tremendous advantage. He was not expected to have a long record at any one job, for instance; his motoring experience in England and Italy was considered quite enough for one of his age to have acquired. Tony revelled in this new side of the age question; his youth had been against him long enough now the tide was turning. In New Zealand he had been too young to do lots of things . . . how far off that was! He hadn’t written to Robertson for ages. It was up to him to go and see the Boss.