"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."
This was decidedly crushing, but I persevered: "But it concerns you, sweetheart."
"Does it?"
As Fay still did not ask what the idea was, I thought I had better volunteer the information. "She thinks you look a little pale and tired and out-of-sorts, and that a change would do you good," I began.
"I am quite all right, thank you. I don't require any doing good at all—in fact, I'm not taking any at present. And as for being pale, the same Providence that painted Annabel's cheeks pink painted mine white, and so we must both stick to the colour ordained for us."
It was uphill work, but I struggled on. I wouldn't for the world have let Fay see how much she was hurting me: it would have pained her tender heart to know she was giving pain; and as long as she could be spared suffering, I was ready to take her share as well as my own. "But the spring is a trying time of the year for everybody," I feebly urged.
"I thought the spring in England was considered such a top-hole sort of affair: one of the seven wonders of the world. The poets simply spread themselves over it."