Annabel's other suggestion I put away from me at once without even playing with it. I knew it was out of the question for me to suggest that Fay's brother should cease to make his home at the Manor as long as my sister lived there. Such a course was more than repugnant to me--it was impossible. But that did not prevent me from fearing the effect of Frank's influence over Fay, nor from feeling the pain of his sudden disaffection towards myself. We had got on so well together at first--he and Fay and I; so well that I had almost persuaded myself that at heart I was as young as they were. But now he had weighed me in the balance of youth and had found me wanting: and my soul shivered with dread lest Fay should do the same. I was used to having Tekel written over my name: custom had gradually dulled the pain of this superscription. But the hurt, which had been lulled by habit, awoke into full vigour when Frank's boyish hand traced the usual word: and I felt that when Fay wrote it too, my heart would break. When Frank returned to Oxford and the Loxleys to town, there followed a very quiet time at Restham Manor. I had looked forward to this quiet time as a schoolboy looks forward to the holidays, thinking at last I should have Fay to myself and could woo and win her back to me. But my hopes were doomed to disappointment. My darling seemed just as far from me as ever, only instead of being gay and laughter-loving she was quiet and depressed. Annabel and I did all in our power to cheer her, but in vain. It was obvious that she was pining for society of her own age, and feeling the reaction after the gaiety of the Christmas vacation. Then my sister came to the rescue with one of her sensible suggestions. Easter fell early that year; so early that Annabel decided it was impossible to elude the East wind altogether, and yet to be at home in time to prevent Blathwayte from succumbing to the temptations of Paschal ritual: therefore--since in her sisterly eyes my chest was of more importance than Arthur's soul--she suggested that she and Fay and I should go to the South of France as soon as the East wind was due, and remain there until after Easter. By this means (though this idea was understood rather than expressed) not only should I be screened from the wind that stirred the Vikings' blood, and Fay be spared the dulness of a Restham Lent, but we should also be away during Frank's next vacation, and so be beyond the sphere of his influence for a longish period. "Annabel has got such a splendid idea, darling," I said to my wife as she was sitting listlessly in the library one morning, glancing indifferently over the newspapers whilst I smoked. "Has she?" Fay's irresponsive mood had become almost chronic by this time. "Wouldn't you like to know what it is?" I continued, valiantly trying to cure her depression by not noticing it. "Not particularly. I'm not an inquisitive person, you know."