out those things.
It's like Mr. Magnus, who says we're treasure hunters or pools of
water, or old men in asylums. I don't understand all that. I'm just
Maggie Cardinal.--All the same I believe one can do what one wants to.
I don't believe people can make one do things."

"Do you think any one could make me not love you if they tried? I shall
love you always, whatever happens. I know I shall never change. I'm not
one to change. I'm obstinate. Father used to say 'obstinate as a pig.'"

That made her think of the old days at St. Dreot's, just then, as they
seemed, so remote. She began to tell him of those old days, of the
Vicarage, of the holes in the floor and the ceiling, of her loneliness
and the way the villagers used to talk, of her solitary walks and
looking down on to Polchester from the hill-top, of her father's sudden
death, of Uncle Mathew ...

"He's a funny old codger," said Martin. "What does he do?"

"I don't know," said Maggie. "I really don't know how he lives I'm
afraid it's something rather bad."

"I've known men like that," said Martin, "plenty, but it's funny that
one of them should be connected with you. It doesn't seem as though you
could have anything to do with a man like that."

"Oh, but I like him!" said Maggie. "He's been very kind to me often.
When I was all alone after father died he was very good--" She stopped
abruptly remembering how he'd come into her bedroom. "Drink's been his
trouble, and never having any money. He told me once if he had money
he'd never do a thing he shouldn't." "Yes," said Martin. "That's what
they always say when they haven't any money, and then when they have
any it's worse than ever."

He was thinking, perhaps, of himself. At any rate to stop remorseful
thoughts he began to tell her about his own childhood.

"Mine was very different from yours, Maggie," he said. "I wasn't
lonely. You don't know what a fuss people made of me. I was conceited,
too. I thought I was chosen, by God, out of all the world, that I was
different from every one else, and better too. When I was only about
nine, at home one Sunday they asked me if I'd say a prayer, and I did,
before them all, made it up and went on for quarter of an hour. Lord! I
must have been an awful child. And outside the religious time I was as
wicked as I could be. I used to go down into the kitchen and steal the
food and I'd dress up as a ghost to frighten Amy and I'd break mother's
china. I remember once, after w