She had rested there in a farm-house, after a time of much turbulence, with the music of running water night and day in her ears, a high-walled garden of flowers and grass about her, and the downs with the shadow-filled hollows, and brown treeless slopes rising up from her very feet.

She could not but think of that short time of peace, and her voice softened as she answered her daughter.
"We don't keep step, Sylvia," she said, with an uneasy laugh.

"I know that.

But, after all, would you be happier with your father, even if he wants to keep you! You have all you want here--frocks, amusement, companions.

Try to be more friendly with people." But Sylvia merely shook her head.
"I can't go on any longer like this," she said, slowly.