And at tea, tired physically and mentally after breathing the exhausted
air of the Rotunda for five hours, my mind suddenly delivered up its
original impression, vivid and clear-cut; no proof accompanied the
revelation; it was mere presentiment, but convincing. Frances was
disturbed in her mind, her orderly, sensible, housekeeping mind; she was
uneasy, even perhaps afraid; something in the house distressed her, and
she had need of me. Unless I went down, her time of rest and change, her
quite necessary holiday, in fact, would be spoilt. She was too unselfish
to say this, but it ran everywhere between the lines. I saw it clearly
now. Mrs. Franklyn, moreover--and that meant Frances too--would like a
"man in the house." It was a disagreeable phrase, a suggestive way of
hinting something she dared not state definitely. The two women in that
great, lonely barrack of a house were afraid.

My sense of duty, affection, unselfishness, whatever the composite
emotion may be termed, was stirred; also my vanity. I acted quickly,
lest reflection should warp clear, decent judgment.

"Annie," I said, when she answered the bell, "you need not send those
blouses by the post. I'll take them down tomorrow when I go. I shall be
away a week or two, possibly longer." And, having looked up a train, I
hastened out to telegraph before I could change my fickle mind.

But no desire came that night to change my mind. I was doing the right,
the necessary thing. I was even in something of a hurry to get down to
The Towers as soon as possible. I chose an early afternoon train.