"If she will," said Mrs. Walton, to which her husband replied,—
"I think, my dear, it is time that Mabel was learning to do what she must, and not what she will. I fear we have ourselves to blame for much of this trouble, which has arisen from the wilfulness and selfishness we have too long overlooked."
But Mabel was so subdued by her trouble, and by her sorrow for her past misconduct to Belle, that she offered no resistance to going to school the next day, further than to say she did not want to go.
"Oh, yes, dear!" said her father: "there is no reason why you should not."
"I'm afraid the children won't believe me about Belle's locket," she whispered; "and they'll look at me."
"But if you stay away it would seem as if you were really guilty," said Mr. Walton. "I do not think your school-mates will be unkind to you; and if they are, you must bear it as a part of the punishment for your naughtiness to Belle. Mamma and I think it better you should go. If you are innocent, you need not be afraid."
And Mabel, quite broken-spirited, submitted without any of the loud outcries with which she usually met any opposition to her wishes.
"I know that they'll all be mad at me, and point at me, and every thing," she sobbed, as she started for school with Belle and the two nurses.
"If any of them are so bad to you, I will tell them to have 'love-charity;' and if they don't, I won't be friends with them any more, but be very offended with them indeed," said Belle, forgetting that her new rule could work more ways than one, and hold good for others than Mabel. Just now she was so full of forgiving pity and sympathy for her cousin that she thought only of helping her and doing battle in her behalf.