That primrose path with Margaret was not to be allowed him, and so sure was he that now he could lie back and look at it all as though he were a spectator and wonder in what way God intended to work it out.

The other side of him--the fighting, battling creature--was, for the moment, dormant.

Soon Bunning would come in and then the fight would begin again, but for the instant there was peace--the first peace that he had known since that far-away evening in St.Martin's Chapel.
As with a drowning man (it is said) so now with Olva his past life stretched, in panorama, before him.

He saw the high rocky grey building with its rough shape and shaggy lichen, its neglected courtyard, its iron-barred windows, the gaunt trees, like witches, that hemmed it, the white ribbon of road, far, far below it, the shining gleam of the river hidden by purple hills.

He saw his father--huge, flowing grey beard, eyebrows stuck, like leeches, on to his weather-beaten face, his gnarled and knotted hands.