"Don't be impudent, or you will be punished," she said. "You will have to improve your manners if you expect to earn your bread. You are not a parlor boarder now. Remember that if you don't please me, and I send you away, you have no home but the street. You can go now."
Sara turned away.
"Stay," commanded Miss Minchin, "don't you intend to thank me?"
Sara turned toward her. The nervous twitch was to be seen again in her face, and she seemed to be trying to control it.
"What for?" she said.
"For my kindness to you," replied Miss Minchin. "For my kindness in giving you a home."
Sara went two or three steps nearer to her. Her thin little chest was heaving up and down, and she spoke in a strange, unchildish voice.
"You are not kind," she said. "You are not kind." And she turned again and went out of the room, leaving Miss Minchin staring after her strange, small figure in stony anger.
The child walked up the staircase, holding tightly to her doll; she meant to go to her bedroom, but at the door she was met by Miss Amelia.
"You are not to go in there," she said. "That is not your room now."