"Perhaps there are two sorts of kindred——"
The girl's cheek flushed.
"And the one you mean may always push out the other? I know, because one of your children told me a story to-day—such a frightful story!—of a saint who would not go to see his dying brother, for obedience' sake. She asked me if I liked it. How could I say I liked it! I told her it was horrible! I wondered how people could tell her such tales."
Her bearing was again all hostility—a young defiance. She was delighted to confess herself. Her crime, untold, had been pressing upon her conscience, hurting her natural frankness.
Helbeck's face changed. He looked at her attentively, the fine dark eye, under the commanding brow, straight and sparkling.
"You said that to the child?"
"Yes."
Her breast fluttered. She trembled, he saw, with an excitement she could hardly repress.
He, too, felt a novel excitement—the excitement of a strong will provoked. It was clear to him that she meant to provoke him—that her young personality threw itself wantonly across his own. He spoke with a harsh directness.
"You did wrong, I think—quite wrong. Excuse the word, but you have brought me to close quarters. You sowed the seeds of doubt, of revolt, in a child's mind."