But Leah found, as many had done before her, that desire is better than success, that there is more zest in striving than in attaining. She had longed for ample funds, and since she possessed full control of the Pentland income this longing was almost, but not quite, satisfied. Nevertheless, her soul was hungry still. She bought everything she fancied, and scarcely cast a look on her most costly and attractive purchases. She travelled with the luxurious surroundings of a queen, and only felt bored; she stopped at home, and yawned incessantly twice round the clock. She would have willingly remunerated the inventor of a new pleasure, but like Xerxes, she could not find so imaginative a man. It was truly lamentable to think that she should possess the moon she had cried for, only to find it was but a used-up world. Jim, on the contrary, flourished healthily under his strawberry leaves, and this best-of-all-possible-world satisfaction added to his wife's exasperation. Daily he grew stouter and more plethoric, daily he made the same stupid observations, and daily he indulged in the gross material pleasures dear to his infinitesimal soul, which was being smothered in superabundant flesh. "You are like a pig removed into a new sty," his wife scornfully informed him. "Not a bad sty," answered the Duke, looking round the room. "Good enough for middle-class people, but not for us, Jim. We are desperately poor as Duke and Duchess." "That's so, Leah; but you spend most of the income." "I have a right to. Don't forget what I have done for you." "You give me no chance," said her husband, bitterly. "Every time we have a row you mention things that needn't be mentioned. And after all, Leah, you got me back for your own convenience." "I am not so sure of that. I wish now that I had kept the thirty thousand which we had to pay back, and had let you remain where you were." "On board Strange's odd-job steamer? It wasn't so bad, though I was chained by the leg. I learnt a lot about engines there; used to watch 'em when she was bumping through hurricanes. They were triple expansion, too. It was fun to watch the old Scotch engineer with his hand on the throttle-valve, and hear him curse when the screw leaped sky-high to race like a motor. I've had worse times--much worse." He spoke with more animation than usual, and Leah sympathised with his enthusiasm. She also would have enjoyed herself on a rotten hulk with doubtful engines and an hourly chance of going down into the great green seas; the excitement would have been intense, and the death a clean one. Perhaps Jim had forgotten the softer emotions of man when the tramp stormed north with every rivet in her hull straining for dispersion. She wondered. "I suppose you missed Señorita Fajardo then?"