"I don't believe mother'd want me to leave the house alone."

"I'll stay an' rest till you git back; I'd jest as soon. I'm all
tuckered out comin' up the hill."

Patience was very pale. She cast an agonized glance at Martha. "I
spent the Squire's sixpence for those peppermints," she whispered. She
had not told her before.

Martha looked at her in horror--then she begun to cry. "Oh! I made you
do it," she sobbed.

"Won't you go with me?" groaned Patience.

"One little gal is enough," spoke up Susan Elder. "He won't like it if
two goes."

That settled it. Poor little Patience Mather crept meekly out of
the house and down the hill to Squire Bean's, without even Martha's
foreboding sympathy for consolation.

She looked ahead wistfully all the way. If she could only see her
mother coming--but she did not, and there was Squire Bean's house,
square and white and massive, with great sprawling clumps of white
peonies in the front yard.

She went around to the back door, and raised a feeble clatter with the
knocker. Mrs. Squire Bean, who was tall and thin and mild-looking,
answered her knock. "The--Squire--sent--for--me"--choked Patience.