the huddle of civilization are not to be gathered from books or solitude.
Sisily was completely unsophisticated in the ways of the world, and her
deep passionate temperament was full of latent capacity for good or evil,
for her soul's salvation or shipwreck. Because of her upbringing and
temperament she was not the girl to count the cost in anything she did.
She was a being of impulse who had never learnt restraint, who would act
first and think afterwards.

Her dislike of her father was instinctive, almost impersonal, being based,
indeed, on his treatment of her mother rather than on any resentment of
his neglect of herself. But Robert Turold had never been able to
intimidate his daughter or tame her fearless spirit. She had inherited too
much of his own nature for that.

At that moment she was sitting motionless, immersed in thought, her chin
on her hand, looking across the water to the horizon, where the Scilly
Islands shimmered and disappeared in a grey, melting mist. She did not
hear the sound of Charles Turold's footsteps, descending the cliff path in
search of her.

The young man stood still for a moment admiring her exquisite features in
their soft contour and delicate colouring. He pictured her to himself as a
white wildflower in a grey wilderness. He could not see himself as an
exotic growth in that rugged setting--a rather dandified young man in a
well-cut suit, with an expression at once restless and bored on his
good-looking face.

He scrambled down the last few slippery yards of the path and had almost
reached her side before she saw him.