Isobel renewed her voyage somewhat chastened in spirit. But her
volatile nature soon survived the shocks it had received. By the time
the Kansas put her ashore at Tilbury, to be clasped in the arms of a
timid and tearful aunt, she was ready as ever for the campaign of glory
she had mapped out in London and Paris.
And she was a success, too. Her father's victory over the copper ring,
her own adventures, which lost nothing in the telling, and her
vivacious self-confidence, carried her into society with a whirl.
Recently, her engagement to an impecunious peer was announced.
* * * * * * Captain Courtenay, R.N., and his wife are not such distinguished
personages, but their romance had a sequel worthy of its unusual
beginning. They were married quietly a week after the Kansas reached
London. There was some war scare in full blast at the moment, and a
Lord of the Admiralty who deigned to read the newspapers thought it was
a pity that a smart sailor should not risk his life for his country
rather than in behalf of base commerce. So he looked up Courtenay's
record, and found that it was excellent, the young lieutenant's reason
for resigning his commission being the necessity of supporting his
mother when her estate was swept away by a bank failure. The Sea Lords
made him a first-rate offer of reinstatement in the service, at a
higher rank, without any loss of seniority, and they went about the
business with such dignified leisure that Dr. Christobal had time to
find out, through men whom he could trust, that Elsie's small estate in
Chile contained one of the richest mines in the country. He secured a
bid of many thousands of pounds for it, and advised Mrs. Courtenay to
accept half in cash and half in shares of the exploiting company.
Hence, there was no need for Courtenay to decline a new career in the
magnificent service which Mr. Boyle once sniffed at, and Elsie became a
prominent figure in that very select circle which clusters around the
ports mostly favored by his Majesty's ships.
It was not unreasonable that Gray should go back to Chile to take
charge of Elsie's mine, nor that Mr. Boyle should become captain and
Walker chief engineer, of the Kansas, but there was one wholly
unexpected development which fairly took Elsie's breath away when she
heard of it.
She was with her husband in London. While passing the National Gallery
one day, she remembered the picture by Claude which deals with the
embarkation of Saint Ursula and her Eleven Thousand Virgins. A painter
herself, Elsie had an artist's appreciation of the vanity which led
Turner to bequeath his finest canvasses to the nation with the proviso
that they should be placed cheek by jowl with those of his great rival,
the Lorrainer. So a fat fox-terrier was given in charge of a catalogue
seller, and they passed up the steps.