It was not in the least to be expected that poor Jenny would have power over her fate when her fate came in her way, and indeed her mother assumed the complete control, and did not require her to have an opinion for herself. Mrs Nat took a liking to the dark-eyed, handsome, young fellow who, in those days, haunted the house persistently, professing himself willing to leave the sea-coast where he had lived, to settle in the village, and find work in the town. Mrs Nat found him lively, and loved to joke with him; the father was secretly uneasy, but dared not express his doubts; and Rob Salter himself had a fancy for the welcome and the suppers, and the pretty child who was shy when he looked at her. In those days they would often make excursions to the sea, and Rob would be generous and pay for everyone; and Jenny loved the tumbling waves, and the long, low line of sand-banks, and the bare, flat fields that gleamed in the evening light. It was on one of those evenings when he stood alone with her on the shore, and a pale light made a mystery of the sea and sands, that he whispered to her, and it was all arranged. The father and mother were merry as they travelled back that night; it was well for them that they did not live to see the rest. For it was all settled, and there was a quiet wedding-day, and Jenny returned after two days to a cottage of her own, and it was all so wonderful that she could not imagine how she should ever get over the wonder of it. And yet, after all, it was but a common-place experience, and she settled down, by degrees, to her cottage-home, though the first weeks of her new life were overshadowed by such grief as she had not known before. For Nat Phillips came home with a fever from the town, and his wife caught it from him as she nursed him that night, and in the course of a few days both were dead, and Jenny followed her parents to their grave. She was overwhelmed with grief and bewilderment; she could not imagine herself without her mother’s rule; and the villagers, who had more knowledge than she had of her husband, shook their heads over the thought that the protection of her parents was lost. Of this, however, they said nothing to the young wife; and, perhaps, if they had done so, she would not have understood.