ten o'clock
She reached the public road just in time to stop the heavy car , and to swing herself lightly on , to all appearances merely a rather unusually well-set-up , fashionably dressed young lady , presenting to the heterogeneous indifference of the other passengers in the car even a more ostentatiously abstracted air than is the accepted attitude for young ladies traveling alone . One or two of her fellow voyagers wondered at the deep flush on her face , but forgot it the next moment . It was a stain which was not entirely to fade from Sylvia 's face and body for many days to come . She reached home , as she had thought , before ten o'clock , her unexpected arrival occasioning the usual flurry of exclamation and question not to be suppressed even by the most self-contained family with a fixed desire to let its members alone , and a firm tradition of not interfering in their private affairs . Judith had come home before her father and now looked up from her game of checkers with wondering eyes . Sylvia explained that she was not sick , and that nothing had happened to break up or disturb the house-party . `` I just _ felt _ like coming home , that 's all ! ''