"I am sorry," said Kate, taking their upbraidings with a meekness quite unusual in her. "I am very sorry for the punishment I have brought upon you, girls; but not sorry that I did not—tell a lie."
"You should have thought of that before," said Mary, "and not let Fanny and me tell what you so elegantly call a lie, and then set yourself up for being so truthful."
"I do not set myself up for being truthful," said Kate, colouring deeply; "at least I have not, but, with God's help, I will from this day," and she looked steadily into Mary's angry face. "I wish—oh, how I wish!—I had spoken when Mrs. Ashton asked the general question of the whole class, or that she had asked me first; and, even to the moment when she called my name, I meant to deny it—but I could not with Bessie Bradford's eyes upon me."
"Bessie Bradford! little Bessie! and what had she to do with it?" asked two or three of the girls.
"She had this much to do with it," said Kate, "that she was in the room yesterday when the clock was broken; and when we resolved to hide it, we tried to make her as deceitful as ourselves; but we tempted, threatened, and promised in vain. She was not to be frightened into wrong for fear of the consequences of doing right; and, as Julia said, she, baby as she is, shamed us all. Yes, shamed me at least, and made me feel what a mean coward I was beside her."
"You are a coward, to be sure, if you are afraid of Bessie Bradford, or what she could do or say," said Mary, pretending to misunderstand Kate.
"I was not afraid of anything she would say or do," said Kate, not noticing the contemptuous tone; "but of what she would think of me, of losing her affection and respect. But"—she went on more slowly, as if half ashamed, yet determined to speak out—"that was not all I was afraid of."
"What else, then?" asked Mary,
"Of offending Bessie's Master," said Kate.
She felt it was a bold avowal to make in the presence of all her classmates—for her who had always been so reckless and careless, sometimes even irreverent; but she said it, and that with a gravity which showed she meant it, and that it was no light feeling which had called it forth.