"After paying death duties and legacies, the residuary estate would be worth about fifty-three thousand pounds at present-day prices. I must make it clear that that is at present-day prices, Miss Paget. You must not assume that you would inherit that sum in 1956. A falling stock market affects even trustee securities."
Noel Strachan is a solicitor who has been entrusted to oversee the bequeathment of an inheritance to Jean Paget. Paget is the novel's protagonist who in this quote is just learning of the amount which will eventually be coming her way. Strachan's reference to her not being able to actually inherit the stated amount until 1956 is an indirect commentary on the misogyny of Jean's benefactor. That man is an uncle she never knew who, Strachan observes elsewhere, was deeply committed to the patriarchal belief that females, by nature, are too irresponsible and unworldly to be entrusted with maintenance of money. It is worth noting that the inheritance would make Jean worth more than a million dollars in 2023 when adjusted for inflation. In other words, even though the twenty-seven-year-old Jean will not actually get the full amount until she reaches age thirty-five, even with the effects of a stock market dip she stands to become a very wealthy woman. It is this transformation of her economic state that serves as the engine for the plot.
"Directly I got back to England I went back to Southampton, as soon as I could—I had something or other to do down there, but really it was because all through those years I had promised myself that one day I would go back and skate there again. And it had been blitzed. It was just a blackened and a burnt-out shell—there's no rink in Southampton now."
The story flashes back to the years during World War II when Jean was one of a group of women taken prisoner by Japanese soldiers in Malay. Paget is speaking to Strachan here at the point at which she reveals her rather horrific experience in the recent past during the war. This particular passage illustrates the nostalgic nature of Jean before going on to demonstrate the means by which the war altered even the smallest of details from one's past. This quote is effective and significant because of its efficiency. The promise that Jean makes to herself under the terrible conditions indicates a strong and stable psychological state of mind. The reference to the skating rink which no longer exists connects to the way that the pre-war Jean herself has been altered. This excerpt also foreshadows Jeans commitment to doing what she says and her attention on how small details can change the big picture in meaningful ways.
"I have thought many times that there should be a well in this place, so that you should not have to fetch fresh water from the spring morning and evening, but you could walk out of your houses only fifty paces at the most and there would be a well of fresh water with a bucket that you could go to and draw water at any time of the day whenever you had the need of cool, fresh water."
The previous quote cemented the idea that Jean is a person who follows through when she gets a notion to do something. Like going back to visit where the skating rink had once been, Jean also gets into her head the thought of building a well in a Malay village in which she lived in the three years before the war ended. She became involved with the natives in the village and eventually took on a leadership role among the women who had been forced into death marches and held prisoner until their Japanese guard dies. The idea which caught fire in Jean's mind is simple enough. Building a well will facilitate the ability to bring water to the villagers. The significance of this quote is its simplicity. All that Jean is describing is literally a way to make getting water as easy as it is for hundreds of millions around the world. In making this a reality, a small village will be transformed. Jean's life prior to her experiences as a prisoner-of-war was notably as unexceptional as the ease with which most people in England could easily get fresh water in their house. The story is ultimately about how the rigors of her wartime experiences transformed Jean into a woman with a simple dream that could not be made a reality until without sufficient economic resources.
