She hid her face in her hands.
“You are unstrung, my poor child,” said her father. He took to treating her almost as an invalid, and failed to perceive that his watchful and incessant solicitude produced upon Flora’s nerves an effect that was the very reverse of soothing.
“She ought to go right away from home,” said Lucilla to Quentillian. “But it’s difficult to suggest it again, she was so much upset when I spoke of it before. Will you try what you can do, Owen? She is a great deal more likely to listen to someone who is not one of the family. It’s one of the symptoms.”
“Symptoms of what?”
“Of hysteria,” said Lucilla succinctly, facing the word as she had already faced the fact.
Quentillian admired her directness, but it did not breed in him any desire to adopt the measure suggested, and speak to Flora.
At last, however, he did so. They had scarcely been alone together since the day when she had told him of her visit to Mrs. Carey.
“Is that business on your mind, Flora?”
He had thought for some time that it might be.
“What?”