Elisabeth looked puzzled. "I don't see anything brickish in saying that; it was the truth. It was you that made me tell, you know; and it wasn't fair for me to be praised for your goodness."
"You really are awfully straight, for a girl," said Christopher, with admiration; "you couldn't be straighter if you were a boy."
This was high praise, and Elisabeth's pale little face glowed with delight. She loved to be commended.
"It was really very good of you to speak to Miss Farringdon about the books," continued Christopher; "for I know you'll hate having to ask permission before you read a tale."
"I didn't do it out of goodness," said Elisabeth thoughtfully—"I did it to please you; and pleasing a person you are fond of isn't goodness. I wonder if grown-up people get to be as fond of religion as they are of one another. I expect they do; and then they do good things just for the sake of doing good."
"Of course they do," replied Christopher, who was always at sea when Elisabeth became metaphysical.
"I suppose," she continued seriously, "that if I were really good, religion ought to be the same to me as Cousin Anne."
"The same as Cousin Anne! What do you mean?"
"I mean that if I were really good, religion would give me the same sort of feelings as Cousin Anne does."
"What sort of feelings?"