lived ever so far off
then."

"O dear," sighed Prudy, "I wish he hadn't gone to the wars. How it
made you cry!"

"Hush up, please, can't you, Prudy?" said Susy. "Aunt Madge is telling
a story."

"Well, they sent for the doctor in great haste, and then tried to pull
off my boot; but my foot was so badly swollen, and bleeding so fast,
that it took a great while. I can't tell how long, for I fainted. When
the doctor saw the wound they said he looked very sober."

"'So, so, little girl,' said he (that was after I came to myself),
'you thought you'd make me a good job while you were about it. There's
no half-way work about you. You are the child that had the tip of a
finger clipped off in the corn-sheller, hey?'"

"I was always afraid of Dr. Foster, so I only buried my face in my
apron, and cried."

"'She must have brought the hatchet down with a great deal of force,'
said the doctor. 'See, Mrs. Parlin, how deep it went into the bone.'"

"'I fell and hit my foot,' I sobbed out. 'I never _touched_ the
hatchet!'"

"I knew well enough that the doctor didn't believe me."

"'So, so,' said he. 'Very well, never mind how 'twas done, but keep
your foot still, little one, and we'll talk about the hatchet another
time. Mrs. Parlin, if it goes to bleeding again, be sure to send for
me.'"

"It was ever so long before I could walk a step. Every time any body
spoke of my hurt, I said, 'Why, I was just coming into the house with
those clams, and my foot slipped, and I fell and hit me on something.
I don't know whether it was a hatchet or a stick of wood; but I never
touched the hatchet!'"

"There, I shouldn't have thought that of _you_, auntie," said Grace.

"Poh!" cried Horace, "they must have known you was a-foolin'; of
course they did!"

"Well, every time the doctor came to see me, he laughed and asked me
how I cut my foot."

"'Just the same as I did in the first place, you know,' said I. 'I
don't know nothing about it, only I never touched the hatchet!'"

"'Well,' he would answer, 'you remember the old saying, A lie well
stuck to, is better than the truth wavering.'"

"I didn't know what that meant, but he laughed so that I knew he was
making sport of me. I knew nobody believed me. The hatchet had been
found red with blood, and mother looked, O, so sad! but I had told
that falsehood so many times that it did seem as if I hadn't any
courage left to tell the truth. It had grown to be very easy to keep
saying, I ne