"It's not nearly so romantic as if we had been obliged to spend a lonely night shivering in the hut," said the colonel. "We've missed rather an interesting adventure, but it's much more comfortable, after all. By-the-bye, will your mother feel anxious if she sees the other children return without you?"
"She's gone to Ferndale this afternoon to buy some more paints and drawing paper," replied Isobel. "You can't get sketching materials in Silversands. She won't be home until seven o'clock, because there isn't a train earlier. I shall have to take tea alone."
"Better have it with me," suggested her friend. "I feel I owe some return for the hospitality you exercised in the hut. I haven't forgotten the nice cup of tea you made. You must see my flowers, and I can send you home afterwards in the dog-cart."
"That _would_ be nice!" cried Isobel, her joy at the prospect showing itself in her beaming face. "We saw your garden from the top of the Scar that day we went into your grounds, and I thought it looked _lovely_."
"Well, I believe I have as good a show as most people in the neighbourhood," admitted the colonel; "but you shall judge for yourself. Here we are at the landing-place. Take care! Give me your hand, and I will help you out."
The Chase appeared to have a private wooden jetty of its own, which led on to a strip of shingly beach, at the other side of which an iron gate admitted them into a small plantation of fir trees, and through a shrubbery into the garden. Isobel could not restrain a cry of pleasure at the sight of the flowers, which were now in the prime of their early autumn glory, and she did not know whether to admire more the little beds, gay with bright blossoms, which dotted the smoothly mown lawns, or the splendid herbaceous borders behind, full of dahlias, sunflowers, gladioli, hollyhocks, torch lilies, tall bell-flowers, and other beautiful plants.
"I must show you all my treasures," said the colonel, pleased with her appreciation, as he took her to the pond where the pink water-lilies grew, and the bamboo and eucalyptus were flourishing in the open air.
"You don't often find subtropical plants so far north," he explained, with a touch of pride as he pointed them out; "but this is a very sheltered situation, and we protect them with matting during the winter. You should see the irises in the spring and early summer; they are a mass of delicate colour, and thrive so well down by the water's edge."