"Please don't go, Aunt Christian. Oh, I am so miserable!"
"I don't see any occasion for any misery, Marion. What is all the trouble about? Think it over now, and tell me without any exaggeration what the matter is. You did wrong about Therese, and might have occasioned great harm, but we hope none has been done. That matter is easily disposed of."
"I don't see how."
"Simply, my dear, by owning that you were in the wrong, and then thinking no more about it. What next?"
Marion did not know, only "she was very unhappy, and all she did was wrong, and—"
"Now, Marie, what do you mean by that?" interrupted her aunt. "You don't mean to say that you believe all you do to be wrong because you won't acknowledge that you were to blame even in one particular? However, I see there is no use in talking. I advise you to go to bed and get rested, and to-morrow perhaps you will see matters differently. Good-night. I must go to bed myself, so that I can relieve Sister Baby at two o'clock."
"I suppose there is no use in my offering to do anything?" said Marion.
"Why, you are hardly in a state to be of much use just now, my dear, and the case is rather too serious to be left to a young nurse like you—no offence to your skill. I think the best thing you can do is to say your prayers and go to bed and to sleep as soon as possible, that you may be ready to help in the morning."
Marion went to bed, but not to sleep.
Aunt Christian's plain dealing had torn a little hole in the veil of self-conceit which usually enveloped her, and as she reviewed her conduct for the last few hours she could not help seeing that she had been wrong. Still, her repentance was not of a healthful kind. It was not the fact that she had sinned in indulging uncharitable and undutiful thoughts, in disobedience and self-conceit, which distressed her, but that she had fallen in the estimation of her uncle and aunt.