Margaret so serious and proud, with his clumsy walk, and halting, almost affected picked precision of phrase, and Perrin, the forlorn parasite who looked as though he had been frozen, were married; she would so gladly see them happy, tasting something of the joy which made earth heaven to her. Margaret would be a beautiful lover, very thoughtful and tender, but cold; he was cold-hearted, she thought, and rather frightening. Perrin would be attracted by some little merry woman who would laugh at him and twist him round her finger. Perrin, she confessed to Tom, attracted her more than the other, because he looked so wretched. Being so happy herself, she wished others to be happy. Her education, like most women’s education, had been aimed to make her fear the world, to make her shrink from those characters who judged the world and sought to direct it. Her own world, beautiful as it was, existed only by the exclusion of such characters; her nature could not accept Margaret wholly; she could only respect and vaguely fear him, as one respects and fears all things which one is not wise enough to understand. Perrin looked wretched, and having a tenderness for wretched folk, she thought that she understood him. All the time, unknown to her, the three men summed her up with pity and reverence and tender devotion; but mostly with pity, and with a mournful, tender curiosity. It was perhaps partly that curiosity which had made their absence pleasant to her. Their absence had been a relief to her, it had also relieved her husband. And since their arrival at Virginia her husband had made her anxious; he had behaved very queerly at times, ever since the first day. She felt that he was keeping something from her, perhaps some ailment which tortured him and made him irritable. She had been very thankful to have her dear love so much to herself during an entire week. But at breakfast that morning the presence of the three men (and the prospect of their future presence) had shown her how much she longed for the quiet retirement of a home, where life could be culled, chosen, made up as one makes a nosegay, by beautiful friends, art, music, all the essences of life, all doubly precious to her now that life had become so precious. “Tom,” she said, “Tom, dear, I want to talk to you about our life here. I don’t think it can go on, dear.” “Why, little Olive, what’s up? What ruffles your serenity?” “Tom, dear, I cannot bear this ship life. And those three men. At every meal I feel that one of them is watching me. Oh, and no woman to talk to. I think of our lovely times at Salcombe, Tom. We could shut the door; and it would be just our two selves.” “Jolly times at Salcombe, hadn’t we? But what’s the matter, eh?” “This ship life, Tom. It’s that. The men are so rude, and so rude to you, Tom. I can’t go on with it. I want to go back to England.” “But I’ve promised to go to Darien, Olive.”