"This is Rosy's room," she said. "I thought it would be nice for you to be near each other. And I know you are very tidy, Bee, so you will set Rosy a good example—eh, Rosy?"
She said it quite simply, and Beata would have taken it in the same way half an hour before, but looking round the little girl caught an expression on Rosy's face which brought back all her distress. It seemed to say, "Oh, you're beginning to be praised already, I see," but Rosy's mother had not noticed it, for Rosy had turned quickly away. When, however, Mrs. Vincent, surprised at Beata's silence, looked at her again, all the light had faded out of the little face, and again she seemed on the point of tears.
"How strangely changeable she is," thought Mrs. Vincent, "I am sure she used not to be so; she was merry and pleased just as she seemed a moment or two ago."
"What is the matter, dear?" she said. "You look so distressed again. Did it bring back your mother—what I said, I mean?"
"I think—I suppose so," Beata began, but there she stopped. "'No," she said bravely, "it wasn't that. But, please—I don't want to be rude—but, please, would you not praise me—not for being tidy or anything."
How gladly at that moment would she have said, "I'm not tidy. Mamma always says I'm not," had it been true. But it was not—she was a very neat and methodical child, dainty and trim in everything she had to do with, as Rosy's mother remembered.
"What shall I do?" she said to herself. "It seems as if only my being naughty would make Rosy like me, and keep me from doing her harm. What can I do?" and a longing came over her to throw her arms round Mrs. Vincent's neck, and tell her her troubles and ask her to explain it all to her. But her faithfulness would not let her think of such a thing. "That would do Rosy harm," she remembered, "and perhaps she meant to be kind when she spoke that way. It was kinder than to have kept those feelings to me in her heart and never told me. But I don't know what to do."
For already she felt that Mrs. Vincent thought her queer and changeable, rude even, perhaps, though she only smiled at Beata's begging not to be praised, and Rosy, who had heard what she said, gave her no thanks for it, but the opposite.
"That's all pretence," thought Rosy. "Everybody likes to be praised."
Mrs. Vincent went downstairs, leaving the children together, and telling Rosy to help Beata to take off her things, as tea would soon be ready. Beata had a sort of fear of what next Rosy would say, and she was glad when Martha just then came into the room.