"I am very sorry to hear you speak so," said her mother. "I think if
you ask _yourself_, Rosy, you will very often find that you are
not good, and if you see and understand that when you are not good it
is nobody's fault but your own, you will surely try to be better. You
must not say it was your aunt's fault, or anybody's fault. Your aunt
was only too kind to you, and I will never allow you to blame her."

"I wasn't good last night," said Rosy. "I doubled up my hand and I hit
Colin, 'cos I got in a temper. I was going to tell you--I meant to
tell you."

"And are you sorry for it now, Rosy dear?" asked her mother, very
gently.

Rosy looked at her in surprise. Her mother spoke so gently. She had
rather expected her to be shocked--she had almost, if you can
understand, _wished_ her to be shocked, so that she could say to
herself how naughty everybody thought her, how it was no use her
trying to be good and all the rest of it--and she had told over what
she had done in a hard, _un_sorry way, almost on purpose. But
now, when her mother spoke so kindly, a different feeling came into
her heart. She looked at her mother, and then she looked down on the
ground, and then, almost to her own surprise, she answered, almost
humbly,

"I don't know. I don't think I was, but I think I am a little sorry
now."

Seeing her so unusually gentle, her mother went a little further.