"Oh, I hope I shall be a good girl, and deserve your kindness," said she: "indeed I have nothing to be proud of, but I have given Bella a great deal of trouble, and you, my dear Mamma, and thought nothing of it; pray forgive me."
Mrs. Meridith re-assured her of her forgiveness, and only hoped the foregoing scene might be impressed on her memory, and prevent her thinking so highly of herself another time; and she then proposed their walking to the farm together.
[CHAPTER IV.]
When Anna returned with her kind friend to Rosewood, she sought for Bella in order to tell her that she was sorry that she had hitherto given her so much trouble, and found her busily employed at needle-work, and two or three little girls of the village with her, to whom she was distributing several articles of clothing. This, for the present, prevented Anna's speaking of what she came to say, and she only asked, "what she was about?" and why these little girls were there.
They were not unknown to her, and she had formerly played with them before she left the farm; but now they saw her white frock and yellow shoes, and remembered she was taken to be Mrs. Meridith's daughter, they each made her a curtesy:
"Oh, don't curtesy to me;" said Anna, full of what had passed in the morning; "I am only a little girl like yourselves, and if it had not been for a good uncle and aunt, and Mrs. Meridith's kindness, I should have been a great deal worse off than you, for I had no father or mother to take care of me."
"Oh, Miss Anna, don't talk so," said Bella; "every body loves you, and would be glad to take care of you."
"But I would wish her not only to talk so, but to think so also," said Mrs. Meridith, who just then entered the room, and had heard Anna speaking, "if it will keep her mindful not to give more trouble than she can help; and I should be sorry she should forget, that these little girls have as much right to her kindness as she has to mine, when she has it in her power to show them any."