In a more serious mood, however, she asked him presently, "I suppose it has been rather a disappointment?... This coming out to Rhodesia to make a fortune!"

"Why do you think so?"

"O, well, lots of reasons. You haven't come within sight of the fortune, for one thing; and you've still got packing-case furniture and live in huts. And you eat a lot of bully beef, now don't you?"

"We do."

"But that isn't what you came for?"

"Still"—meditatively—"it's not a small thing to be in a country where a fortune may be won any day. It is that, of course, which keeps us going. It is better anyhow than a stool and one hundred and fifty pounds a year in England."

"Are you sure?" And she watched him with keen eyes.

He coloured slightly, but answered with firmness:

"Quite."

"But not better than something else, perhaps?"