ELLIE. Does nothing ever disturb you, Captain Shotover? CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. I've stood on the bridge for eighteen hours in a typhoon. Life here is stormier; but I can stand it. ELLIE. Do you think I ought to marry Mr Mangan? CAPTAIN SHOTOVER [never looking up]. One rock is as good as another to be wrecked on. ELLIE. I am not in love with him. CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. Who said you were? ELLIE. You are not surprised? CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. Surprised! At my age! ELLIE. It seems to me quite fair. He wants me for one thing: I want him for another. CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. Money? ELLIE. Yes. CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. Well, one turns the cheek: the other kisses it. One provides the cash: the other spends it. ELLIE. Who will have the best of the bargain, I wonder? CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. You. These fellows live in an office all day. You will have to put up with him from dinner to breakfast; but you will both be asleep most of that time. All day you will be quit of him; and you will be shopping with his money. If that is too much for you, marry a seafaring man: you will be bothered with him only three weeks in the year, perhaps. ELLIE. That would be best of all, I suppose. CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. It's a dangerous thing to be married right up to the hilt, like my daughter's husband. The man is at home all day, like a damned soul in hell. ELLIE. I never thought of that before. CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. If you're marrying for business, you can't be too businesslike. ELLIE. Why do women always want other women's husbands? CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. Why do horse-thieves prefer a horse that is broken-in to one that is wild? ELLIE [with a short laugh]. I suppose so. What a vile world it is! CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. It doesn't concern me. I'm nearly out of it. ELLIE. And I'm only just beginning. CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. Yes; so look ahead. ELLIE. Well, I think I am being very prudent. CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. I didn't say prudent. I said look ahead. ELLIE. What's the difference? CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. It's prudent to gain the whole world and lose your own soul. But don't forget that your soul sticks to you if you stick to it; but the world has a way of slipping through your fingers. ELLIE [wearily, leaving him and beginning to wander restlessly about the room]. I'm sorry, Captain Shotover; but it's no use talking like that to me. Old-fashioned people are no use to me. Old-fashioned people think you can have a soul without money. They think the less money you have, the more soul you have. Young people nowadays know better. A soul is a very expensive thing to keep: much more so than a motor car. CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. Is it? How much does your soul eat? ELLIE. Oh, a lot. It eats music and pictures and books and mountains and lakes and beautiful things to wear and nice people to be with. In this country you can't have them without lots of money: that is why our souls are so horribly starved. CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. Mangan's soul lives on pig's food.