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head. I love clothes and I have a passion for hats, and one can’t get anything decent in Wairiri. How I ache sometimes for London again, and the shops! If you can supply me with pretty hats, I don’t care what you teach the children.”

She picked up another photograph.

“And who is the nice-looking young man?”

“He traveled on the ship with me.”

“I suppose he wanted to marry your”

Ann did not answer for a moment.

“Oh, of course he did,” said Mrs. Holmes. “They all do...on ships. Did you say yes?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I didn’t love him.”

Vera Holmes gave a sudden hard laugh.

“Love!” she echoed. But she put the photograph down, and said no more on the subject.

“Those two men are talking sheep as usual,” she went on abruptly. “Wool and mutton, mutton and wool! That’s all men ever talk about in this country. What price did Smith’s wool fetch, and how much did Jones get for his fat lambs from the Works? I suppose you can’t play bridge, can you? That would be too much to hope for.”

“Of course I can,” said Ann.

“Oh, thank God,” murmured Mrs. Holmes. “Come along and we’ll end that interminable discussion of wool and mutton and hogets and two-tooths.”

So Ann’s evening ended very much more cheerfully than it had begun, for she played five good rubbers, at the end of which she was richer by the whole sum of ninepence. But as she got into bed that night she reflected that though she had not yet decided in her