"They say they can't find out where she's been.

She won't tell.

Don't you believe somebody has threatened her if she does ?" Cynthia raised herself and began to speak, but a slight, almost imperceptible gesture from the man beside her stopped her.
"What did you say, Cynthia ?" "There is no accounting for children's freaks," said Risley, shortly and harshly.

Mrs.Lloyd was not thin-skinned; such a current of exuberant cordiality emanated from her own nature that she was not very susceptible to any counter-force.

Now, however, she felt vaguely and wonderingly, as a child might have done, that for some reason Lyman Risley was rude to her, and she had a sense of bewildered injury.