to see who was there, or peeping through her fingers at
a little boy, who peeped back again.

Mary whispered to her to sit still, and Siller Noonin shook her head;
but Patty did not consider Mary worth minding, and had no particular
respect for Siller. Finally, just at the close of a long prayer, she
happened to spy Daddy Wiggins, who was sleeping with his mouth open, and
the sight was too much for Patty: she giggled out-right. It was a very
faint laugh, hardly louder than the chirp of a cricket; but it reached
the sharp ears of Deacon Turner, the tithing-man,--the same one who sat
in church watching to see if the children behaved well, and he called
right out in meeting, in a dreadful voice,--

"_Patience Lyman!_"

If he had fired a gun at her head it would not have startled her more.
It was the first time she had ever been spoken to in public, and she
sank back in Mary's arms, feeling that all was over with her. Other
little girls had had their names called out, but they were generally
those whose parents did not take proper care of them,--rude children,
and not the sort with whom Patty associated.

O, what would her mother say? Was there any place where she could go and
hide? Sally Potter would never speak to her again, and Linda Chase would
think she was a heathen child.

She didn't care whether she ever had any new clothes to wear or not;
what difference would it make to anybody that lived out in the barn? And
that was where she meant to live all the rest of her days,--in one of
the haymows.

Kind sister Mary kept her arm round the sobbing child, and comforted
her, as well as she could, by little hugs. The meeting was soon over,
and Patty was relieved to find that she had the use of her feet. So
crushed as she had been by this terrible blow, she had hardly supposed
she should be able to walk.

CHAPTER V.

A WITCH-TALK.

"It was real mean and hateful of Deacon Turner," says Mary, as they went
back to Dr. Hilton's. "You didn't giggle any, hardly, and he knew you
didn't mean to. I'll tell father, and he won't like it one bit."

Patty choked back a sob. This was a new way of looking at things, and
made them seem a little less dreadful. Perhaps she wouldn't stay in the
barn forever; possibly not more than a year or two.

"Deacon Turner is a very ha'sh man," said Siller; "but if he'd stopped
to think twice, he wouldn't have spoken out so to one of you children;
for you see your father is about the