They might have known what was coming by Grannie's behaviour. One day, the day when the Australian mail arrived, she had subsided suddenly into a state of softness and gentleness. She approached her son-in-law with an air of sorrowful deprecation; she showed a certain deference to her daughter Louie; she was soft and gentle even with Emmeline and Edith.
Mrs. Fleming broke the news to Louie who broke it to Frances who in her turn broke it to Anthony. That was the procedure they invariably adopted.
"I wonder," Grannie said, "what he can be coming back for!" Each time she affected astonishment and incredulity, as if Morrie's coming back were, not a recurrence that crushed you with its flatness and staleness, but a thing that must interest Louie because of its utter un-likeliness.
"I wonder," said Louie, "why he hasn't come before. What else did you expect?"
"I'm sure I don't know," said Grannie helplessly. "Go and tell Frances."
Louie went. And because she knew that the burden of Morrie would fall again on Frances's husband she was disagreeable with Frances.
"It's all very well for you," she said. "You haven't got to live with him. You haven't got to sleep in the room next him. You don't know what it's like."
"I do know," said Frances. "I remember. You'll have to bear it."
"You haven't had to bear it for fourteen years."
"You'll have to bear it," Frances repeated, "till Anthony sends him out again. That's all it amounts to."