Even more pleasing to Wolf than the success of Mr. Valley’s suggestion about Jason’s poetry was the upshot of his own advice to Darnley about his relations with Mattie. These two were definitely going to be married on the first Saturday in March, a day that happened to occur just one day after the anniversary of his own appearance on the scene. T. E. Valley had already begun reading their banns in the church; and on the strength of his approaching marriage, Darnley had obtained a small rise of salary at the Blacksod Grammar School.

On Saturday, February the twenty-fifth, Wolf awoke, after writing very late into the night, to a happy consciousness that Mr. Urquhart’s finished manuscript lay on the card-table in their parlour!