He was amazingly collected and calm. He told her how he proposed a house for them far from other dwellings, where they would have peace from the people and privacy and silence. He had found such a place on the upper waters of Meavy, where stood a ruin that might easily be restored and made a snug and comfortable home. He meant to breed ponies and sheep. The suggestion was that Rhoda joined them and looked after the dogs. He could hardly get on without her, and she would certainly be very miserable away from him. "She reckons that no woman living be good enough for you," said Margaret, faintly. Her voice showed her heart was hungry, empty. She had expected a meal and it was withheld. David laughed. "To be frank, she do." "And no man living good enough for herself." "As to that, the right one will come along in time. She shan’t marry none but the best. She likes you well, Madge, as well as she may; but she hasn’t got hold of the idea of me married yet. Now she’ll jolly soon have to do it. There’s five hundred pound has come to me, you must know, under the will of my mother’s brother who died back-along. It’s goodied a bit since and us’ll have some sheep and you’ll have a nice little lot of poultry. And Sir Guy will rebuild the ruin. It is all his ground. And now you’ve said ’yes,’ I shall ask ’em to begin. When can you come to see the place?" "So soon as ever you like," she said. "I hope ’tisn’t too far away from everybody." "Not so far as I could wish; but far enough. The ruins be old miners’ works; and we’ll have a shippen and a dog-kennel and all complete, I promise you." For a long time he talked of his hopes and plans, but she came not directly into them. It seemed that her help was hardly vital to the enterprise. At last she brought the matter back to the present; and she spoke in tones that might have touched the stone she sat on. "I’ll try so hard to make you a good wife, David." He started and became dimly conscious of the moment and the mighty thing that had happened to him in it. "I know that right well. Too good for me every way. Too gentle and soft and beautiful. I’ll be tremendous proud of you, Madge. And I’ll do my share, and work early and late for you, and lay by for you, and lift you up, perhaps, in ten years or so to have a servant of your own, and a horse and trap of your own, and everything you can wish." "I wish for you to love me always, always, always--nothing but that." "And so I shall, and the best love be what swells the balance at the bank quickest. Now I know you can take me, I feel as if I should like to get up off this rock this instant moment and go away and begin working like a team of horses for ’e." "Don’t go away yet. Think what this is to me--so much, much more than it can be to you."