And in the same way people got hold of you, after a while ... even those you disliked, let alone people like Mrs. Grisedale and Mrs. Ellwood. In spite of yourself they became part of your life,--that life which you had not wanted, perhaps, which had either been thrust upon you, or which you had chosen by mistake, but which nevertheless you had steadily gone on living. You could not keep yourself away from people, no matter how you tried. Even if you shared nothing else with them, you shared the same countryside. Your life was marked by the milestones of their happenings, just as their lives were marked by yours. And when the time came to die, you lay down together to sleep in the same soil.... She was too old for Canada, she said to herself, accepting the fact calmly because as yet it had not come home to her. Not too old in body, perhaps, in spite of her age, but almost certainly in spirit. You could not fret and fight, year after year, as she had fretted and fought, without something wearing out in you. And even her body felt too old to-night for the land of which she had always thought as a place of vivid youth. She would feel better in the morning, of course,--better and more equal to things,--because you always did feel better in the morning. It was one of the lessons of life that you could face things in the morning which you could not face at night. But always the night came again.... In any case, something told her that to-day she had touched what was for her the highest point of living. After to-day she would begin definitely to grow old. Safety was what you needed most when you were beginning to get on; not to be high adventurers and pioneers. Pioneers and adventurers weren’t safe,--couldn’t be, in the nature of things. Whatever happened, she and Kirkby would have certain dangers to face, even though they were not going actually into the wilds. Dangers from people and food, from climate and travel and strain.... There were dangers everywhere, of course,--even here; but long custom had taught them how to avoid them. You got used to most of your dangers, except for those unforeseen; and when you were used to your dangers they were no longer very dangerous. Safety and peace and quiet, and a certain amount of ease; not hen-hulls and yelling children, such as Cousin Jessie had pictured. Jessie, of course, had been drawing the long bow, even if she had not been telling absolute untruths. But it would be different from England, nevertheless. Whatever Luke’s home might be like, it would not have the settled dignity of the home in which he had been reared. As for their own, which had yet to be built, it would have even less than Luke’s. It would have no dignity because it would have no memories and no past. It would be empty, and they would not have time to fill it. They would barely have grown used to it, and it to them, before death, with a crooked finger, would beckon them both out.