The mistress took her word - for she had always been truthful - and said :
"You were puzzled, I suppose, dear child; let me help you," and she kindly showed her how to work the sum.
As she was going back to her seat, Claribel hung her head, for she knew that she had told a lie, and although it need now never he found out, she was sorrowful, and felt as if she were standing outside the shining City. Even then if she had rushed up to the mistress and said:
"I have done wrong; but I will be a better child again," all would have been well; but she did not, and every minute that passed made such a thing harder to do.
Soon after school was over, and Claribel went sadly home. She did not care to play, for she had told a lie, and her heart was heavy.
When bed-time came she lay down weary, but could not sleep; and she cried very bitterly, for she could not pray. She was sorry that she had told a lie, and she thought it rather hard that her sorrow was not enough to make her happy again; but her conscience said -
"Will you confess to-morrow?" But she thought that it would not be necessary, for the sin was over and she had not done harm to anyone. But all the time she knew that she was wrong. Had the mistress spoken of this, she would have said -
"It is ever thus, dear children. A sin cannot be wiped away till the shame comes first; for without the shame and the acknowledgment of guilt the heart cannot be cleansed from the sin."
At last Claribel sobbed herself to sleep.
Then when she slept, the Child Angel stole into the room and passed over her eyelids, so that even in her sleep she saw the beautiful light, and she thought of the City like a jasper stone, clear as crystal, with its twelve gates with names written thereon. She dreamed that she saw the Angel with the golden reed measuring the city, and Claribel was so happy that she forgot all about her sin. The Child Angel knew all her thoughts, and he grew less and less till his light all died away; and to Claribel in her dream all seemed to grow dark, and she knew that she was standing without the gate of the Beautiful City. The Angel, who held the measuring reed of gold, stood on the battlements of the city, and in a terrible voice said -
"Claribel, stand thou without; thou makest and lovest a lie."
"Oh, no," said Claribel, "I do not love it."
"Then why not confess thy fault?"
Claribel was silent; but she would not confess her sin, for her heart was hard, and the Angel lifted the golden reed, and lo! it blossomed a beautiful lily. Then the Angel said -
"The lilies grow only for the pure, who live within the city; thou must stand without among the liars."
Claribel saw the jasper walls before her towering up and up, and she knew that they were an eternal barrier to her, and that she must ever stand without the Beautiful City; and in the anguish and horror she felt how deep was her sin, and longed to confess it.
Skooro saw that she was repenting, for he, too, could see into her thoughts, and with the darkness of his presence he tried to blot out the whole dream of the Beautiful City.
But the Child Angel crept into her heart and made it light, and the seed of repentance grew and blossomed.
Claribel woke early, and rose and went and told her mistress of her sin, and was happy once more.
All her life long she loved the lilies; for she thought of her lie and of her repentance for it, and that the lilies grow within the Jasper City, which is for the pure alone.