From the day she stepped into it Mrs Murchison knew that the Plummer Place was going to be the bane of her existence.

This may have been partly because Mr Murchison had bought it, since a circumstance welded like that into one's life is very apt to assume the character of a bane, unless one's temperament leads one to philosophy, which Mrs Murchison's didn't.

But there were other reasons more difficult to traverse: it was plainly true that the place did require a tremendous amount of "looking after," as such things were measured in Elgin, far more looking after than the Murchisons could afford to give it.

They could never have afforded, in the beginning, to possess it had it not been sold, under mortgage, at a dramatic sacrifice.

The house was a dignified old affair, built of wood and painted white, with wide green verandahs compassing the four sides of it, as they often did in days when the builder had only to turn his hand to the forest.