One bright March day, Mavis held two letters in her hand as she sat by the window of her sitting-room at Mrs Budd’s.  She read and re-read them, after which her eyes would glance with much perplexity in the direction of the daffodils now opening in the garden in front of the house.  She pondered the contents of the letters; then, as if to distract her thoughts from an unpalatable conclusion, which the subject matter of one of the letters brought home to her, she fell to thinking of the daffodils as though they were the unselfish nurses of the other flowers, insomuch as they risked their frail lives in order to see if the world were yet warm enough for the other blossoms now abed snugly under the earth.  The least important of the two letters was from Major Perigal; it had been forwarded on from Melkbridge.  In his cramped, odd hand, he expressed further admiration for Mavis’s conduct; he begged her to let him know directly she returned to Melkbridge, so that he might have the honour of calling on her again.  The other letter was from Windebank, in which he briefly asked Mavis if she would honour him by becoming his wife.  Mavis was much distressed.  However brutally her heart had been bruised by the events of the last few months, she sometimes believed (this when the sun was shining) that some day it would be possible for her to conjure up some semblance of affection for Windebank, especially if she saw much of him.  His mere presence radiated an atmosphere of protection.  It offered a welcome harbourage after the many bufferings she had suffered upon storm-tossed seas.  If she could have gone to him as she had to Perigal, she would not have hesitated a moment.  Now, so far as she was concerned, there was all the difference in the world.  Although she knew that her soul was not defiled by her experience with Perigal, she had dim perceptions of the way in which men, particularly manly males, looked upon such happenings.  It was not in the nature of things, after all that had occurred, for Windebank to want her m a way in which she would wish to be desired by the man of her choice.  Here was, apparently, no overmastering passion, but pity excited by her misfortunes.  Mavis had got out of Mrs Trivett (who had long since left for Melkbridge) that it was Windebank who had insisted on paying the expenses of her illness and stay at Swanage, in spite of Major Perigal’s and his son’s desire to meet all costs that had been incurred.  Mavis also learned that Windebank and Charles Perigal had had words on the subject—­words which had culminated in blows when Windebank had told Perigal in unmeasured terms what he thought of his conduct to Mavis.

As Mavis recalled Windebank’s generosity with regard to her illness, it seemed to her that this proposal of marriage was all of a piece with his other behaviour since her baby had died.  Consideration for her, not love, moved his heart.  If she were indeed so much to him, why did he not come down and beg her with passionate words to join her life to his?