“Despite all her strengths, there was a certain brittleness to her. Sometimes she retreated intoher keep. Sometimes she ran away. But she did not forgive and she did not forget.”

“Betsy did not answer. She was a talker, her family always said, but sometimes when she most wanted to talk she couldn't say a word.”

“Robin told only a little of her life, but she kept repeating in one way or another her wish for a home, as if she were afraid she would be lost again, as if she were aware, without conscious knowledge, that she belonged to Nora, and that if Nora did not make it permanent by her own strength, she would forget.”

“Its sound in her soul was a distant fast train. Love did not bring happiness, it did not last, and it ended in pain. She did not want to believe this, and she was not certain that she did; perhaps she feared it was true in her own life, and her fear had become a feeling that tasted like disbelief.”

“She stood in the storm, & when the wind did not blow her away, she adjusted her sails.”

“Sometimes Peter treated her like she was the only thing in the forest. Sometimes he was so distracted by the things around him that she had to keep up or be left behind. But a lot of times, she knew he did it on purpose, and she didn't have to know why. He seemed to have reasons for doing things even he didn't understand.”