came Life and one was swept away. And, lying in her cane chair, Linda felt
so light; she felt like a leaf. Along came Life like a wind and she was
seized and shaken; she had to go. Oh dear, would it always be so? Was
there no escape?

...Now she sat on the veranda of their Tasmanian home, leaning against her
father's knee. And he promised, "As soon as you and I are old enough,
Linny, we'll cut off somewhere, we'll escape. Two boys together. I have a
fancy I'd like to sail up a river in China." Linda saw that river, very
wide, covered with little rafts and boats. She saw the yellow hats of the
boatmen and she heard their high, thin voices as they called...

"Yes, papa."

But just then a very broad young man with bright ginger hair walked slowly
past their house, and slowly, solemnly even, uncovered. Linda's father
pulled her ear teasingly, in the way he had.

"Linny's beau," he whispered.

"Oh, papa, fancy being married to Stanley Burnell!"

Well, she was married to him. And what was more she loved him. Not the
Stanley whom every one saw, not the everyday one; but a timid, sensitive,
innocent Stanley who knelt down every night to say his prayers, and who
longed to be good. Stanley was simple. If he believed in people--as he
believed in her, for instance--it was with his whole heart. He could not
be disloyal; he could not tell a lie. And how terribly he suffered if he
thought any one--she--was not being dead straight, dead sincere with him!
"This is too subtle for me!" He flung out the words, but his open,