‘You made me. You were so cross if I only asked a question,’ and Val prepared to cry.
‘I thought people had to do their own work and not other folks’! Don’t be so foolish.’
‘Oh dear! oh dear! how unkind you are! I wish--I wish Mysie was here; every one is grown cross! Oh, if mamma would but come home!’
‘Now, Val, don’t be such a baby! Stop that!’
And Valetta went into one of her old agonies of crying and sobbing, which brought Aunt Jane in to see what was the matter. She instantly stopped the scolding with which Gillian was trying to check the outburst, and which only added to its violence.
‘It is the only thing to stop those fits,’ said Gillian. ‘She can if she will! It is all temper.’
‘Leave her to me!’ commanded Aunt Jane. ‘Go!’
Gillian went away, muttering that it was not the way mamma or Nurse Halfpenny treated Val, and quite amazed that Aunt Jane, of all people, should have the naughty child on her lap and in her arms, soothing her tenderly.
The cries died away, and the long heaving sobs began to subside, and at last a broken voice said, on Aunt Jane’s shoulder, ‘It’s--a--little bit--like mamma.’
For Aunt Jane’s voice had a ring in it like mamma’s, and this little bit of tenderness was inexpressibly comforting.
‘My poor dear child,’ she said, ‘mamma will soon come home, and then you will be all right.’
‘I shouldn’t have done it if mamma had been there!’
‘She will be grieved that you could not hold out when you were tempted; but I am sure she will forgive you if you write it all to her. And, Val, you know you can have God’s forgiveness at once if you tell Him.’
‘Yes,’ said Valetta gravely; then, ‘I did not before, because I thought every one made so much of it, and were so cross. And Georgie and Nellie don’t care at all.’
Valetta sat up on her aunt’s lap, and told.
‘Maura told me! She said Kally and Alec both were at her, but her mamma was vexed with them, and said she would not have her scolded at home as well as at school about nothing; and she told Theodore to go and buy her a tart to make up to her, but Theodore wouldn’t, for he said he was ashamed of her. So she sent the maid. But when Maura had gone to bed and to sleep, she woke up, and there was Kally crying over her prayers, and whispering half aloud, “Is she going too? My poor child! Oh, save her! Give her the Spirit of truth--“’