"She ain't sick," said her mother, severely. "She's fretting because
she can't wear her gold ring to school."

"O Comfort, you must wait till your hand grows to it," said her Aunt
Susan.

"Yes, of course she must," said her Uncle Ebenezer.

"Eat your supper, and your hand will grow to it before long," said
her father, who, left to himself, would have let Comfort wear the
ring.

"It wouldn't do for you to wear that ring and lose it. It's real
gold," said her grandmother. "Have another piece of the sweet-cake."

But Comfort wanted no more sweet-cake. She put both hands to her face
and wept, and her mother sent her promptly out of the room and to
bed. Comfort lay there and sobbed, and heard her Uncle Ebenezer's
covered wagon roll out of the yard, and sobbed again. Then she fell
asleep, and did not know it when her mother and grandmother came in
and looked at her and kissed her.

"I'm sorry she feels so bad," said Comfort's mother, "but I can't let
her wear that ring."

"No, you can't," said her grandmother. And they went out shading the
candle.

Comfort said no more about the ring the next morning. She knew her
mother too well. She did not eat much breakfast, and crept off