"If I knew it was so wicked, I would not have looked at it at all," said Rosamond. "And you know she said she only read the first poem, in which there was no harm."
"Yes, but who can ever believe her? I know I shall never trust her again. When I have found any one out once, there is the end of it with me."
"According to your own account you are just as bad as Vevette," said Rosamond; "that is, if you don't tell lies every day."
"Rosamond, what do you mean?" said Margaret, in a voice of amazement that almost made me laugh aloud. "I as bad as Vevette?"
"According to your own showing," returned Rosamond, in the same matter-of-fact way. "Don't you say every day of your life that you have done the things you ought not to have done, and left undone the things you ought to have done—that there is no health in you, and you are a miserable sinner? I don't know what Vevette could say of herself worse than that."
"Rosamond, you are very pert," said Meg, and I could tell by her voice that she was offended. "Of course one says those things because they are in the prayers of the church, and the Bible says we are all sinners; but I should like to know wherein I fail in my duty. Do I ever tell lies, or read bad books, or miss my church or sacrament? Don't I—" Here she stopped, in a little confusion as it seemed, thinking, I fancy, that it was not quite seemly thus to blazon her good deeds, however highly she might rate them.
"Then if you never do wrong or omit to do good, why do you say you do?" persisted Rosamond. "Is that telling the truth? Take care, sister! It was the publican who went down to his house justified, rather than the man who thanked God he was not as other men."
"You are very impertinent to lecture your elder sister in this way," returned Margaret. "I shall speak to my mother;" and she walked away.
"I believe you are in the right, Rosamond," said Andrew. "We have been too hard on the poor child. If it were anything but deception!"
"I do not read in Scripture that one sin is worse than another," returned Rosamond. "The Bible saith not so, but that he that offendeth in one point is guilty of all. Besides—"