"I won't stand it—I won't! The house is his, not ours; and, if he won't enjoy his own home, we must clear out of it—that's all. Business indeed! I don't believe a word of it; he hadn't more business in Kelvick after hours than I had. He just remained there shut up in that dingy parlor all alone because he thought we should be happier without him—because he felt he'd be in the way in his own house, one too many at his own dinner-table. It's simply carrying things too far, and I won't stand it. I'll tell him so to-morrow, whether he snubs me or not. He can't silence me for a year, he'll find—I'll tell him so to-morrow."
But the morrow does not bring Mr. Armstrong to Nutsgrove. After a long drowsy morning spent shut up in the family-pew, Addie proclaims herself invalided with a racking headache, and unable to take part in the celebration of her sister's birthday. So the family, among whom sympathy with the sick and afflicted is not a distinguishing trait, after vaguely suggesting tea, soda-water, eau-de-Cologne, and the rest, depart grove-ward with a goodly hamper, leaving her alone on a couch in the drawing-room window, limp and feverish with pain.
It is dark before they return in boisterous spirits, full of their adventures, and with countenances smeared with blackberry-juice.
"Oh, Hal, I wish you would not shout so!" pleads Addie. "If you could feel how your voice goes through my head!"
"Beg pardon, I'm sure, Addie; I quite forgot all about your head—at least I thought it was all right by this," Hal answers, in a voice that plainly says, "What a fuss to make about a bit of a headache!"
"Perhaps it would be better for you to go to bed, Addie," Pauline suggests briskly.
So Addie retires and sits by her open window, with wide dry eyes and burning cheeks.
"How selfish they are!" she mutters petulantly. "They never even asked if I was better. Oh, they have fallen off somehow—all of them! They're not quite the same—there's something changed. I—I wonder is the change in them, or in me, or in both? I wish I knew. The last time I had a headache it was so different—so different! I remember it was on the day after that long drive in the sun to the Lover's Leap; and, when I came home, he had the room all darkened, and my head bandaged with a handkerchief steeped in iced eau-de-Cologne, and the band stopped in the hotel garden all the afternoon, and—and everything I could want by my side. And I never even thanked you, Tom; I don't think I felt grateful. What a wretch I was—what a wretch!"