Consequently , it may be wondered why she was unhappy . In plain English , Frances Farquhar had been jilted -- just a commonplace , everyday jilting ! She had been engaged to Paul Holcomb ; he was a very handsome fellow , somewhat too evidently aware of the fact , and Frances was very deeply in love with him -- or thought herself so , which at the time comes to pretty much the same thing . Everybody in her set knew of her engagement , and all her girl friends envied her , for Holcomb was a matrimonial catch . Then the crash came . Nobody outside the family knew exactly what did happen , but everybody knew that the Holcomb-Farquhar match was off , and everybody had a different story to account for it . The simple truth was that Holcomb was fickle and had fallen in love with another girl . There was nothing of the man about him , and it did not matter to his sublimely selfish caddishness whether he broke Frances Farquhar 's heart or not . He got his freedom and he married Maud Carroll in six months ' time . The Farquhars , especially Ned , who was Frances 's older brother and seldom concerned himself about her except when the family honour was involved , were furious at the whole affair . Mr. Farquhar stormed , and Ned swore , and Della lamented her vanished role of bridemaid . As for Mrs. Farquhar , she cried and said it would ruin Frances 's future prospects . The girl herself took no part in the family indignation meetings . But she believed that her heart was broken . Her love and her pride had suffered equally , and the effect seemed disastrous . After a while the Farquhars calmed down and devoted themselves to the task of cheering Frances up . This they did not accomplish . She got through the rest of the season somehow and showed a proud front to the world , not even flinching when Holcomb himself crossed her path . To be sure , she was pale and thin , and had about as much animation as a mask , but the same might be said of a score of other girls who were not suspected of having broken hearts . When the summer came Frances asserted herself .
The Farquhars went XXXXX Green Harbour every summer .
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