“There's mother at the window now,” Cynthia said, as she got out of the buggy. “I can see that she's angry even from here.”
“I'll hitch Jack and go in and explain,” offered Floyd.
“Oh no, don't!” Cynthia said, quickly. “I'll tell her all about it. Go on. Good-bye.”
“Good-bye, then,” Floyd said, and he drove on to the village.
But Mrs. Porter did not come to the door to meet her as Cynthia expected. The girl found her alone in the sitting-room seated sulkily at the fireplace, where a few sticks of damp wood were burning gloomily.
“Well, where did you spend the night?” the old woman asked, icily.
Cynthia stood before her, withered to her soul by the tone in which her mother's question had been asked.
“You are not going to like it a bit, mother,” the girl said, resignedly. “The storm overtook us just as we got to Long's mill. The horse was frightened and about to run away and the road was awfully dangerous. There was nothing for us to do but to go in.”
“Long's mill! Oh, my God! there is no one living there, nor in miles of it!”
“I know it, mother.”