She was amiable enough, nicely formal, and perfectly bred, it is true, but inclined to that sort of aloofness which is marked by lapses of inattention and the smiling silences of preoccupation.
She had married, very young, an army officer convalescing from Texan fever.

He died suddenly on the very eve of their postponed wedding-trip.

This was enough to account for lapses of inattention in any woman.
But Kathleen Severn had never been demonstrative.

She was slow to care for people.

Besides, the responsibility of bringing up the Seagrave twins had been sufficient to subdue anybody's spirits.