Mind you, Doug did not pose as one of the world’s wayfarers, without justification. He _had_ travelled, quite a lot, and beyond the ordinary tourist zone. And he had enjoyed it, too, though his relish for discomfort multiplied enormously in retrospect. No other post but secretary to the Knapsack would have held him faithful. But at the Knapsack he could absorb daily all his favourite atmosphere of travel--the talk of routes and equipments, the fantastic anecdotes, the society of the right sort of men, thin, cheerful, leathery fellows; without yielding his regular salary, his duties to his mother, or the pleasures of London, three meals a day, electric light, telephone and taxis. His qualifications of good temper, good breeding and competence made him popular with the members of the Club. It was travelling by proxy, certainly, and many evenings he came home to Ursula in the “break-away and be damned to my salary and this damned monotonous safety” mood ... but Ursula was always a little bit too ready to assent and encourage him and dare an uncharted future. She was eager for pain and horror, the tragedy of making mistakes--all the perils along the road that might break in sudden dazzle and glory. She was eager only to go and not to stay--never to stay. But Doug was very young at all his ages, and his resolutions needed resistance, as a puppy’s teeth need bone if they are to sharpen effectively. Presently his performance of a stern, rugged spirit clenched against the call of lagoons and mountains and bronchos, the lure of the Far East and the Far West and small animal-whimpers through primeval forests at night--were played to other audiences than Ursula; audiences who would not say: “Oh yes, let’s!”--audiences of Monica and Kitty and--and Doreen. Nobody, not even Doug himself, had thought it worth while to warn little schoolgirl Ursula from loving and marrying a man who was beyond everything else, and beyond laughter and tears, and beyond cure, susceptible. Monstrously, grotesquely susceptible. Being married made him more susceptible than before, because it gave him a reason why he must not be--a reason with hard bone in it. Lord! how he renounced them, Monica and Kitty and--no, not Doreen; he was just going to renounce her, when her people took her away from the boarding-house, which was disconcerting. How he began to tell them about lagoons, etc., and where he would like to take them--and then abruptly was silent, mouth set, jaw squared, but blue eyes still narrowed and dreamy with inward vision of two tiny figures alone together in the Sudan or on a coral island.... “Look here, my dear, shut me up when I get talking ... like this. It isn’t good for either of us. I’m getting soft, that’s the trouble. But for a man to know eternally where his next meal’s coming from--He ought to sling it home on his shoulders, while his mate----” “Hush, Doug--we mustn’t.”