"Oh, it doesn't, Doctor Fuller, indeed it doesn't!" sobbed Constance, utterly unstrung. "I've tried it, tried it again and again, and it only makes the wrath turn the harder upon me; it never turns it away! Indeed, indeed I've faithfully tried it."
"It's a hard pilgrimage for you at times I fear, Constance, but never turn aside into wrong on your part," said the good doctor, gently.
"Oh, I'm sorry I flared up, I am sorry I spoke angrily. But my father! To blame him when he is so patient, and has so much to endure! Must I beg his wife's pardon?" said Constance, humbly.
Doctor Fuller concealed a smile. Sorry as he was for Constance, and indignant at her stepmother's unkindness, it amused him to note how completely in her thoughts Constance separated herself from the least connection with her.
"I think it would be the better course, my dear, and I admire you for being the one to suggest it," he answered, with an encouraging pat on Constance's sleeve.
"Well, I will. I mean to do what is right, and I will," Constance sighed. "But I truly think it will do no good," she added.
"Nor I," Doctor Fuller agreed with her in his thoughts, but he took good care not to let this opinion reach his lips.
[CHAPTER IV]
The First Yuletide
Constance had a tender conscience, quick to self-blame. She was unhappy if she could impute to herself a fault, ill at ease till she had done all that she could to repair wrong. Although her stepmother's dislike for her, still more her open expression of it, was cruelly unjust and prevented all possibility of love for her, still Constance deeply regretted having spoken to her with lack of respect.