“You will forgive me for slapping your face, won’t you, dear brother?” she said, “you know I could not help feeling angry, when I saw that you had spoilt my beautiful doll; but I do not want you to be punished, and so I have not told anybody except Mrs Norton, and she found it out of herself.”
“You are afraid of being punished for slapping my face,” answered the ungrateful little boy.
“Oh, how can you say that, Norman?” exclaimed Fanny, ready to burst into tears at the unfeeling observation. “I would have told mamma that I slapped you, but then I knew that that would have shown what you had done; but I did tell Mrs Norton, and she said I was wrong, and I knew I was, and I want you to forgive me for that.”
“I do not know what you mean by ‘forgive,’” said Norman.
“That you do not feel angry or vexed, or wish to slap my face, or do me any harm, and that you love me as much as you did before, and will try to forget all about it,” answered Fanny. “That is what I think is the meaning of forgiving, and that is what I know I ought to do about the way you treated Miss Lucy. I wish there would not be the ugly mark on her neck, which I am afraid she always will have, even when Mrs Norton gets her head put on, as she has promised to do; but I must try and make her a high frock with a frill, which will come under her chin, and hide it, and then I shall not see the mark, and so I hope I shall soon forget what you did to her.”
Norman opened his large eyes, and fixed them on his sister.
“I think I know better than I did before what to forgive means,” he observed; “I wish, Fanny, I was more like you.”
Just then Susan, who had been looking for the children to get them ready for tea, came in, and led off Norman. Unfortunately she had discovered how he had treated Miss Lucy, and she thought fit to give him another scolding. This made him angry, and he entirely forgot all that Fanny in her gentle way had told him about forgiveness. Once more he hardened his heart and thought that now he was equal with Fanny, as he had lost his football, and her doll had lost its head.
Captain Vallery returned home later than usual. Norman, who heard his ring at the door, ran down to meet him, and was much disappointed to find that he had not brought a new football.
“I thought, papa, that you would have remembered that my football is spoilt,” he exclaimed, “and would have brought another.”