Ellen was silent. Her aunt repeated the question in a sharper tone.
"I oughtn't to say what I was going to," said Ellen "I'd rather not."
"I don't care," said Miss Fortune; "you began, and you shall finish it. I will hear what it was."
"I was going to say, if we were all free I would run away."
"Well, that _is_ a beautiful, well-behaved speech! I am glad to have heard it. I admire it very much. Now, what were you doing yesterday up on the Nose? Please to go on wiping. There's a pile ready for you. What were you doing yesterday afternoon?"
"And who were you with the rest of the time?"
"Miss Humphreys! what were you doing with her?"
"What were you talking about?" repeated Miss Fortune.
"And I had rather you _should_ tell so out with it."
"I was alone with Miss Humphreys," said Ellen; "and it is no matter what we were talking about it doesn't concern anybody but her and me."
"Yes it does, it concerns me," said her aunt, "and I choose to know; what were you talking about?"
"I vow you're enough to try the patience of Job! Look here," said Miss Fortune, setting down what she had in her hands "I _will_ know! I don't care what it was, but you shall tell me, or I'll find a way to make you. I'll give you such a "
"Stop! stop!" said Ellen wildly "you must not speak to me so! Mamma never did, and you have no _right_ to! If Mamma or Papa were here, you would not _dare_ talk to me so."
The answer to this was a sharp box on the ear from Miss Fortune's wet hand. Half stunned, less by the blow than the tumult of feeling it roused, Ellen stood a moment, and then throwing down her towel, she ran out of the room, shivering with passion, and brushing off the soapy water left on her face as if it had been her aunt's very hand. Violent tears burst forth as soon as she reached her own room tears at first of anger and mortification only; but conscience presently began to whisper, "You are wrong! you are wrong!" and tears of sorrow mingled with the others.
"Oh!" said Ellen, "why couldn't I keep still? when I had resolved so this morning why couldn't I be quiet? But she ought not to have provoked me so dreadfully I couldn't help it." "You are wrong," said conscience again, and her tears flowed faster. And then came back her morning trouble the duty and the difficulty of forgiving. Forgive her aunt Fortune! with her whole heart in a passion of displeasure against her. Alas! Ellen began to feel and acknowledge that indeed all was wrong. But what to do? There was just one comfort, the visit to Miss Humphreys in the afternoon. "She will tell me," thought Ellen; "she will help me. But in the mean while?"