Joan, dressed for use rather than show, and without either shoes or stockings, had stolen stealthily downstairs: something seemed to be calling to her.
Silently--"like a thief in the night," to adopt Mrs.Munday's metaphor--had slipped the heavy bolts; had joined the thousand creatures of the wood--had danced and leapt and shouted; had behaved, in short, more as if she had been a Pagan nymph than a happy English child.

She had regained the house unnoticed, as she thought, the Devil, no doubt, assisting her; and had hidden her wet clothes in the bottom of a mighty chest.

Deceitfulness in her heart, she had greeted Mrs.Munday in sleepy tones from beneath the sheets; and before breakfast, assailed by suspicious questions, had told a deliberate lie.

Later in the morning, during an argument with an active young pig who was willing enough to play at Red Riding Hood so far as eating things out of a basket was concerned, but who would not wear a night-cap, she had used a wicked word.

In the afternoon she "might have killed" the farmer's only son and heir.