But she had been severed from her root.

She listened to the girl's sobbing and stroked her hair.
"Don't be afraid.

There's no one left to hear but the walls and the bare trees in the wood," she said.
Robin sobbed on.
"You've a kind heart, but you're not crying for me," she said next.
"You've a black trouble of your own.

There's few that hasn't these days.
And it's worse for the young that's got to live through it and after it.
When Mary Ann comes to see after me to-morrow morning I may be lying dead, thank God.

But you're a child." The small clutching hands clutched more piteously because it was so true--so true.