"I want to go home." "Silly little thing," thought Sarah. "I wish I'd never played with her." In the morning Sarah was tired and white-faced. She would speak to no one. After luncheon she found her hat and coat for herself, let herself out of the house, and walked to Mrs. Kitson's, and was shown into the wide, untidy drawing-room, where books and flowers and papers had a lost and strayed air as though a violent wind had blown through the place and disturbed everything. Mrs. Kitson came in. "_You_, dear?" she said. Sarah looked at the room and then at Mrs. Kitson. Her eyes said: "_What_ a place! _What_ a woman! _What_ a fool!" "Yes, I've come to explain about Mary." "About Mary?" "Yes. It's my fault that she's ill. I took a ring out of that little table there--the gold ring with the red stone--and I made her promise not to tell. It's because she thinks she ought to tell that she's ill." "_You_ took it? _You_ stole it?" Before Mrs. Kitson's simple mind an awful picture was now revealed. Here, in this little girl, whom she had preferred as a companion for her beloved Mary, was a thief, a liar, and one, as she could instantly perceive, without shame. "You _stole_ it!" "Yes; here it is." Sarah laid the ring on the table. Mrs. Kitson gazed at her with horror, dismay, and even fear. "Why? Why? Don't you know how wrong it is to take things that don't belong to you?" "Oh, all that!" said Sarah, waving her hand scornfully. '"I don't want the silly thing, and I don't suppose I'd have kept it, anyhow. I don't know why I've told you," she added. "But I just don't want to be bothered with Mary any more." "Indeed, you won't be, you wicked girl," said Mrs. Kitson. "To think that I--my grand-father's--I'd never missed it. And you haven't even said you're sorry." "I'm not," said Sarah quietly. "If Mary wasn't so tiresome and silly those sort of things wouldn't happen. She _makes_ me----" Mrs. Kitson's horror deprived her of all speech, so Sarah, after one more glance of amused cynicism about the room, retired. As she crossed the Square she knew, with happy relief, that she was free of Mary, that she need never bother about her again. Would _all_ the people whom she compelled to obey her hang round her with all their stupidities afterwards? If so, life was not going to be so entertaining as she had hoped. In her dark little brain already was the perception of the trouble that good and stupid souls can cause to bold and reckless ones. She would never bother with any one so feeble as Mary again, but, unless she did, how was she ever to have any fun again? Then as she climbed the stairs to her room, she was aware of something else. "I've caught you, after all. You _have_ been soft. You've yielded to your better nature. Try as you may you can't get right away from it. Now you'll have to reckon with me more than ever. You see you're not stronger than I am."