"Miss Lothrop was there, wasn't she?"
"Of course she was! That made all the trouble."
"And all the sport too; hey, Tom? Things usually are two-sided in this world."
"She made no trouble. It was my mother and sister. They were so awfully afraid of her. And they drilled George in; so among them they were too many for me. But I think Appledore is the nicest place I know."
"You might buy one of the islands—a little money would do it—build a lodge, and have your Europe always at hand; when the winter is gone, as you say. Even the winter you might manage to live through, if you could secure the right sort of society. Hey, Tom? Isn't that an idea? I wonder it never occurred to you. I think one might bid defiance to the world, if one were settled at the Isles of Shoals."
"Yes," said Tom, with something very like a groan. "If one hadn't a mother and sister."
"You are heathenish!"
"I'm not, at all!" returned Tom passionately. "See here, Philip. There is one thing goes before mother and sister; and that you know. It's a man's wife. And I've seen my wife, and I can't get her."
"Why?" said Dillwyri dryly. He was hanging over the side of the gondola, and looking attentively at the play of colour in the water; which reflecting the sky in still splendour where it lay quiet, broke up in ripples under the gondolier's oar, and seemed to scatter diamonds and amethysts and topazes in fairy-like prodigality all around.
"I've told you!" said Tom fretfully.