"Why, Hepsa; how wicked you are! You shall not talk so!" almost shrieked Genevieve. The tears came fast into her eyes, she was so grieved to hear Hepsa talk in that way.
"But I'm not wicked!" retorted Hepsa indignantly. "I don't know who God is. Why should I? He never comes to see me. I suppose he comes to see you, and is some great person; while I am poor and live in a mean house, and nobody comes to see me, of course." Hepsa looked away from Genevieve's blue frock, and seemed to be searching for something away down the street.
Genevieve could not sit still any longer, but, rising, she remonstrated with Hepsa in this manner:
"God is not a man, Hepsa; and he goes into poor houses as often as into rich ones."
Hepsa looked very sharply upon little Genevieve as she replied,
"Ha! Don't you be telling me stories; why don't I see him ever, I'd like to know? Haven't I got eyes?"
"I don't know," said Genevieve, doubtfully. "Father was reading this morning about people who had eyes, but could not see."
Hepsa looked at her a moment, and then nodded her head towards her, and said, speaking low as to a third person, "She's cracked a little, I think;" then, as she looked towards the fence, she remembered the garden which was behind it, and asked Genevieve for some flowers. But Genevieve only said "O, yes," and went on to say, "Of course you can't see God, Hepsa! He lives in the skies."
"I shouldn't think he would come down here, then. I wouldn't!"