"My father was a master at solving problems. When I lied about taking some chocolate, and as I vehemently denied it, puffed chocolate fumes into Nanny's face, she was very cross. "This is very serious indeed Pammy. Wait until Daddy comes home." To me this sounded like a death sentence, and when she added, "I am not going to punish you, we will wait until we tell Daddy and see what he says." I knew I was done for.
My father was not due to come home for several days, and each hour was agony. I couldn't sleep and Nanny maintained a severe expression whenever she looked my way. When my father finally sent for me - a relief in some ways, at least the waiting was over - I braced myself.
"Nanny tells me that you took a piece of chocolate." He spoke in a quiet, reasonable voice. "That was naughty, Pammy. But what has really upset her is that you told a lie. Its very important in life that you don't tell lies. And so you understand why, I'm going to tell you about a nun." I was surprised at the way this conversation was going.
"Now, nuns are good people. They never do an evil thing and the nun in this story had never told a lie. But there came a moment during a war between the Catholics and the Protestants when she was asked to hide a Protestant man. Of course this nun was a Catholic. When the soldiers came into the convent, they asked her, 'Has a Protestant man been here asking you to hide him?' Looking them straight in the eye, she replied, No.' She lied because she knew that the soldiers would kill the man if they found him. And because nuns are always truthful, the soldiers believed her and went away" He paused so the story would sink in.
I was only seven, so probably looked a little blank. My father took me by the shoulders and said, gently, "You see, Pammy darling, you probably only have one, maybe two opportunities in the whole of your life to tell a lie. So don't waste them on chocolate."
That message went in, all the more because he hadn't scolded me, but had told me a story that I could think about. It stayed with me for a very long time and made me very sorry for having lied about something so trivial.
references:
1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Pamela_Hicks
