She could not possibly write facts, she thought, so her poor little letters were restrained and unlike herself, and to the warm-hearted souls in New York, even appearing stiff and unaffectionate, as if her aristocratic surroundings had chilled her love for them.

In fact, it became far from easy for her to write at all, since Sir Nigel so disapproved of her interest in the American mail.

His objections had indeed taken the form of his feeling himself quite within his rights when he occasionally intercepted letters from her relations, with a view of finding out whether they contained criticisms of himself, which would betray that she had been guilty of indiscreet confidences.

He discovered that she had not apparently been so guilty, but it was evident that there were moments when Mrs.Vanderpoel was uneasy and disposed to ask anxious questions.

When this occurred he destroyed the letters, and as a result of this precaution on his part her motherly queries seemed to be ignored, and she several times shed tears in the belief that Rosy had grown so patrician that she was capable of snubbing her mother in her resentment at feeling her privacy intruded upon and an unrefined effusiveness shown.
"I just feel as if she was beginning not to care about us at all, Betty," she said.