"Don’t preach," said Florentine violently. She was beginning to see the maze of lies and deceptions that lay before her. - Gabrielle Roy

She understood at once, and with the courageous goodwill that sustained her, resigned herself to the fact: there was always a drawback. There had to be. Sometimes it was the lack of light, or a factory nearby, or not enough rooms. Here, it was a railroad.

Home! That was an old word, one of the first the children had ever learned. You used it without thinking, a hundred times a day. It had meant so many different things!..Home was an elastic word and even meaningless at times....

That was when she recognized love: this torture on seeing someone, the greater torture when he was out of sight, in short, a torture without end.