"Still you must admit that Restham hasn't made Sir Reginald very fat," said Fay, looking me up and down with a critical eye. (And for the first time in my life I thanked Heaven that Restham hadn't.) "No, miss; there you have me. Master Reggie was always one of Pharaoh's lean kine, and always will be. It didn't seem to matter when he was young, as I like to see young folks slim and active; but I must say that at his time of life he ought to be getting a bit more flesh on his bones, to help him to fill up his position and look more important and like what a baronet should be." Again I was conscious of a distinct wave of irritation. Why would Annabel and Ponty rub it in so about my age? Surely they could have left the subject alone--for this one afternoon, at any rate! "I suppose when all's said and done," continued Ponty, "it is a judgment on him for not getting married. Now if he'd only a wife and half-a-dozen children to look after him--as he ought to have at his age--he'd be as stout and well-liking as anybody." "I don't believe a wife and half-a-dozen children would look after him as well as you and Miss Kingsnorth do," said Fay, with some truth, in nowise shocked at the mention of the half-dozen children, as Annabel would have been at her age. "But it 'ud be more natural, miss. Still, as I always say, there's hope for all, and marrying late is in Sir Reginald's family on both sides. Her ladyship was by no means young when she married, and Sir John was getting on in years. Which being the case, I haven't but lost hope for Sir Reginald or even for Miss Annabel; though I must own as the gentleman as gets Miss Annabel will have found his master, whoever he may be." Fay smiled, and I tried hard not to. It seemed somehow more disloyal to smile at Annabel with Fay than with Frank. "Come and see the view," I said, going to the deep bay-window, the window-seat of which had been our toy-box in the years gone by. Fay expressed her admiration in no measured terms, and then we said good-bye to Ponty and retraced our steps. "How lovely it must be to have had the same home all your life!" exclaimed Fay. "To have moved on an axis instead of in an orbit, and to have looked at the same things with the eyes of different ages!" "I suppose you have had a good many different homes," I said. "Oh, scores and scores. Both Father and Mother were very restless people, and never could settle long in the same place. And after Mother died, Father grew even more restless, and was always wanting to be on the move. Frankie and I are annuals--not perennials--and have never taken root anywhere." "Still it must have been rather exciting to move about so much."