SANCTUARY
she murmured. "That is the very reason that prevents his speaking."
"The reason?"
"Your knowing what he thinks and his knowing that you know."
Mrs. Peyton was startled at her subtlety. "I assure you," she said, rising, "that I have done nothing to influence him."
The girl gazed at her musingly. "No," she said with a faint smile, "nothing except to read his thoughts."
VI
Mrs. Peyton reached home in the state of exhaustion which follows on a physical struggle. It seemed to her as though her talk with Clemence Verney had been an actual combat, a measuring of wrist and eye. For a moment she was frightened at what she had done—she felt as though she had betrayed her son to the enemy. But
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