"He will be here some time to-morrow." Arthur Allway was her cousin, the son of a Nonconformist Minister.

Her father had taken him into the works and for the last three years he had been in Egypt, helping in the laying of a tramway line.

He was in love with her: at least so they all told her; and his letters were certainly somewhat committal.

Joan replied to them--when she did not forget to do so--in a studiously sisterly vein; and always reproved him for unnecessary extravagance whenever he sent her a present.

The letter announced his arrival at Southampton.