“How criminal I’m getting!” she thought. “First I want to kill Aunt Anne, and now Mrs. Cotton. Either I’ve changed—or I was always like it, only more controlled. I wanted to kill Father the other day, too. I think I’d better go for a walk.” Then she thought how like Aunt Anne that was, and smiled. “Funny. It’s only just lately that I’ve begun to notice those—idiosyncrasies in her. I’m getting critical. Critical and bad-tempered.” She paused, staring out of the window. “Over-critical. About my people. They’re nice. Really nice. It’s just the little, outside things that make me want to kill them. Not seeing things as I see them. Annoying. Awfully annoying. Well ... if I criticise them like that—Aunt Anne especially, because I love her—did I—was I over-critical of Stephen’s friends and—and him? Did I let the outward things get on my nerves? . . . But it wasn’t only that. It was the other thing. Fear. Repulsion. Because I didn’t love him. Only as a friend. Other girls can’t feel as I felt about that physical side. There wouldn’t be any marriages if they did. So if I’d loved him it would have been all right. I didn’t love him. I didn’t know what love was. I still don’t know. Perhaps I was too young. I was too young. I didn’t know anything about men, or about marriage. I didn’t even know what my own feelings were. I was—oh, I was just a child! How could I know? And no one could see it. Aunt Anne, Father—Stephen himself. Yes, Mr. Hengist knew. Mr. Hengist knew everything. He tried to warn me that day when I was so angry. He was the only one. Nobody else thought, or cared, or prepared me in the least. Couldn’t Aunt Anne see that I wasn’t fit to be married? Couldn’t she have told me what it meant?