"I don't want your old presents, you can keep them yourself," retorted Debby hotly, scrambling off the bed hurriedly, and dragging off a collection of gloves and laces with her. Her face was red and angry too, but tears were very near the surface.
Faith held out her arm, "Come and sit beside me, dear, and we will put on your new shoes, to see if they fit."
"I don't care if they fit or not, I don't want them! I wouldn't wear them if they did. Audrey had better keep them for herself—disagreeable old thing," and Debby, mortified and indignant, marched out of the room, banging the door behind her.
Faith's face grew troubled. The child had been so happy a moment before. "She did not know," she murmured apologetically. "She didn't know she was doing wrong, they always sit on my bed. Tom, you had better come off, my quilt is a clean one too."
In the silence that followed, Audrey grew uncomfortable. They had all been so excited and happy a moment before, and now the room was full of gloom. No one took any further interest in her box and what it contained. She knew that she had been only right and Debby very naughty, that children with dusty boots should not sit in the middle of clean white quilts; but perhaps she could have spoken more gently. The children did not know they were doing wrong.
Tom swung himself off the bed, and marched towards the door. Audrey looked at his stormy face nervously. "This is for you," she said, holding a tempting-looking parcel towards him.
For a moment he hesitated, evidently unwilling to accept it from her, but his better instincts prevailed. "Thank you," he said, but coldly, and laying it down without looking at it, he turned to Faith. "I am going to look for Debby," he said, and went out of the room.
"What dreadful tempers!" Audrey, mortified by Tom's snub, grew angry again. "They ought to be sent away to school, to a very strict school. They would be taught, then, how to behave themselves!"
"They aren't really bad," pleaded Faith wistfully. "I think they were hurt, you see Debby didn't know she was naughty, and—and they hardly know you yet. They would not mind so much if they did."
"Well, I think their tempers are dreadful, and their manners too." In her annoyance Audrey could not help speaking out the hard thoughts that were in her heart.