She was horribly afraid of what he might feel impelled to say to her, almost terrified at the bare notion of an explanation, and the prospect of a possible apology was unthinkable.

It was easier for her to sacrifice his good comradeship, though that of itself was no easy matter, and she could only thrust her sense of loss into the background of her thoughts by the most strenuous efforts.
She was sturdily determined to make him relinquish their former pleasant intimacy before they should meet again.

She was growing up, she told herself severely, growing up fast; and intimacies of that sort were likely to be misconstrued.
She took the counsel of none upon this difficult matter.

Her father was too vague a dreamer to guide her, or so much as to realise that she stood in need of guidance.

And Dot had gone her own independent way all her life.