"Was I stiff?" she asked. "I didn't know it. I didn't mean to be."
"You are almost always stiff with strangers," said her cousin. "I know you do not mean it, and you are not conscious of the effect of your own manner; but all the same it is stiff. Now, Cannie, will you promise me not to be hurt at what I am going to say?"
"Why, of course I won't," said Cannie, looking at her with trustful eyes.
"Well then, listen! If I didn't know you,—if you were not my own dear little Cannie, whose warm heart I am sure of, and whose good intentions I know all about,—if I met you for the first time and judged of you merely from your manner, as all strangers must judge,—do you know what I should think?"
"What?"
"I should think you rather a cold-hearted girl, who didn't like people and didn't mind letting them know it."
"Oh, Cousin Kate!"
"Or else, if I were more charitably inclined, I should think you a dull girl who did not take much interest in what went on about her."
"Oh, Cousin Kate!"
"Or," continued her cousin, relentlessly, "if I were a real angel, and disposed to make the very best of everybody, I should say to myself, 'The poor thing is so shy that she can't show what she really is.' Unluckily, there are few perfect angels in this world, and a great many of the other sort. And even as a perfect angel, my dear Cannie, I don't think I should consider you exactly agreeable."