The two ladies walked up the room in which the classes were assembled, and as they came near the place where Buté stood with her eyes sparkling with pleasure, the Miss Sahiba said to her friend, “Here is your little Buté, in the pink chaddar which she says that you gave her and told her to wear.”
“I never gave her a chaddar of any colour,” said the Mem Sahiba with a look of surprise; “what could make the silly child utter such an untruth?”
Do you think that Buté blushed and hung down her head in shame at having been found out guilty of lying? Alas! no. Buté had told so many lies in her short life that she felt no sorrow or shame for the sin. She was only vexed that the Miss Sahiba should know of her falsehood.
If Buté did not care, the Miss Sahiba cared a great deal. She thought, “Oh, how shall I cure this poor child of her terrible habit?” Then turning towards Buté, she said aloud, “Buté, I grieve to find that you have told me an untruth. I cannot let you share in our feast. Retire to the sleeping-room directly; I should not be your true friend if I passed over this matter.”
Then Buté began to cry; not because of sorrow for sin, but because she had lost the feast, and was sent so early to bed. She clasped her hands, and glanced towards her former friend, the Mem Sahiba, as if to entreat her intercession; but the lady looked grave and shook her head. She knew that the punishment had been deserved, and that it would be no real kindness not to inflict it.
But still poor Buté, accustomed from her infancy to hear lies, could not but think herself hardly dealt with. Had her lie got any one into trouble, had she slandered a companion, she would have seen that sin had been committed; “But what did it signify,” thought she, “whether I said truly that the chaddar had been given to me by my father; or untruly, that it had been given to me by the Mem Sahiba?” As Buté turned weeping to go to her room, the Miss Sahiba heard her murmur between her sobs, “Why does she make such a fuss? What harm could the lie do? it was such a little one!”
The feast of fruit began; plenty of nice kélas (plantains) were spread on the floor. Some of the girls were sorry for Buté, sent to remain in her bed to think over her fault; but soon even these girls forgot the poor child, who could hear from her apartment the sound of their laughter and singing. Buté lay crying, listening to the children’s voices, and longing to join them.
As the Miss Sahiba, with her friend, sat watching the young people enjoying their fruit, she was suddenly startled by a scream from the neighbouring room, which was that to which Buté had been sent in disgrace. The scream expressed violent terror or pain; and the Miss Sahiba, who loved the child whom she punished, rushed into the room with such speed to see what could be the matter, that almost before the girls had time to cry, “What has happened?” the lady was at the side of her poor little charge.
Buté was standing on her bed, her face pale with terror, looking at a small black scorpion which was running across the floor. The Miss Sahiba’s heel in a moment had crushed the scorpion, and in a quiet, composed manner she turned to Buté. “Why did you scream so?” she asked.
“It was on my bed—close—quite close to me! I just raised my arm, and it fell on the floor,” cried Buté, who was trembling violently from the effects of the fright.