ed. He seemed to have taken a resolve to
restore the old order of things by force of will. Doubtless his
conversations with Mrs. Ormonde about Annabel were an incentive to
effort; relieved from the weight of suffering, he could see that the
girl was not herself. On Paula's marriage day, he said, in the course
of conversation with Annabel:

'Your aunt desires very much to have you with her for a part of the
season. What do you think of it? Would you care to go up in May?'

Annabel did not at once reject the idea.

'It is my opinion that you need some such change,' her father
continued. 'The last quarter of a year has done you harm. In a month I
hope to be sound enough.'

'I will think of it,' she said. And there the subject rested.

The town was secretly attracting her. The odour of the Tyrrells' house
had exercised a certain seduction. Though she saw but one or two old
acquaintances there, the dining-room, the drawing-room, brought the
past vividly back to her. She was not so wholly alien to her mother's
blood that the stage-life of the world was without appeal to her, and
circumstances were favourable to a revival of that element in her
character which I touched upon when speaking of her growth out of
childhood. It is a common piece of observation that studious gravity in
youth is succeeded by a desire for action and enjoyment. Annabel's
disposition to study did not return, though quietness was once more
restored to her surroundings. And thus, though the settlement at
Eastbourne seemed a relief, she soon found that it did not effect all
she hoped. Her father began to take up his books again, though in a
desultory, half-hearted way. Annabel could not do even that. A portion
of each day she spent with Mrs. Ormonde; often she walked by herself on
the shore; a book was seldom in her hand.

Two or three days before the end of March, Mr. Newthorpe spoke of
Egremont.

'I should like to see him. May I ask him to come and spend a day with
us, Annabel?'

'Do by all means, father,' she answered. 'Mrs. Ormonde heard from him
yesterday. He came into possession of his library-building the other
day.'

'I will write, then.'

This was Monday; on Wednesday morning Egremont came. The nine months or
so which had passed since these three met had made an appreciable
change in all of them. When Egremont entered the room where father and
daughter were expecting him, he was first of all shocked at the wasting
and ageing of Mr. N