To her friend and confidants no word save of pride and love for her husband had ever passed her lips, yet now as she watched her daughter she was conscious of a wild, passionate wish that her fate at least might be a different one.

And while she mopped her eyes and looked backward, Julie disappeared.
Even Julie, as she ascended the stairs with the key of the locked room in her hand, was conscious of unusual tremors.

If her position with regard to her father was not the absolute condition of serfdom into which her mother had been ground down, she was at least afraid of him, and she remembered the strict commands he had laid upon them all.

The room was not to be open save by himself.

All cries and entreaties were to be disregarded, every one was to behave as though that room did not exist.