"Ephraim is joined to idols?" Rachel suggested.
"Yes! Ephraim is joined to his idols!" said Dorothy, lifting her head. "Let him go!"
"Let him alone," corrected Rachel.
"Let him alone!" Dorothy repeated. "That is better yet."
"What's thee thinking of, dear?"
"Oh, I'm thinking about the dance in the barn."
"I'm glad thee looks at it in that light," said Rachel.
Dorothy knelt by her bed in the low chamber under the eaves, crying to herself that she was not the child of her mother any more.
She felt she had lost something, which, in truth, had never been hers. It was only the unconscious poise of her unawakened girlhood which had been stirred. She had mistaken it for that abiding peace which is not lost or won in a day.