"You know. The egg. I'm sorry—"
"Of course you are. Sorry I ate it."
He flushed. I developed a meticulous interest in a pincushion.
"No; sorry to see you eating it so hungrily. You know that's what I meant. Now I know it's all lies when he says eggs are bad for you and that you don't like them and you refuse them when he offers them and that you mustn't eat much of anything. It's all a lie, because he doesn't want you to eat things, because he hates you or because he's mean. I always thought it funny you never had nice things. I asked him three times and he said you were always taking medicine, and the doctor said you must eat very little and always very plain. You must have thought me horrid."
"I did. I'm sorry. Oh, the liar, the mean wretch, he dare tell you all that? Look here, we've begun now, haven't we, so I'm going to tell you what I know of him; everything. First you must answer a question. Do you just not like Uncle, or do you really hate him, hate him like this?" I clenched my fists and ground my teeth together.
"Yes, now I do; he's never done anything to me, but I've liked him a bit less every day I've been here. Now I hate him, like you do."
"Well, I'll tell you, he's a mean, cruel, wicked man. He beats and cuffs and pinches me when you're not looking. He canes me till I bleed. He starves me so as to make as much money as he can out of what my Grandmother pays him. The first morning I came I said No, when he offered me one miserable spoonful of his egg. I've never touched one since, and he's told you all this about my not liking eggs at all. I do take medicine, but it's because I'm ill and don't get enough to eat. He's mean and he hates me, that's why he starves me: one as much as the other. He's nice to you because you're rich and important and have friends and relations. Do they pay a lot of money for you?"
"I don't know."
"They must do or you wouldn't get so much to eat. Oh, the beast, he's always talking as though he was so good and then he starves me and gives me sneakish blows in the dark. He praises the Lord with his lips and he's got the devil in his heart. He flatters with his tongue, but his inward part is very wickedness—"