at her. Poor Comfort had a feeling that Miss Tabitha could see her
very thoughts.

The Stebbinses and Sarah Allen usually stayed at noon, but that day
they all went home. Sarah Allen had company and the Stebbinses had a
chicken dinner. So Comfort stayed alone. The other scholars lived
near enough to the school-house to go home every day unless it was
very stormy weather.

After everybody was gone, Miss Tabitha and all, the first thing
Comfort did was to slide her hand down over the bottom of her pocket,
and carefully feel of it under her dress skirt.

Her heart gave a great leap and seemed to stand still--she could not
feel any ring there.

Comfort felt again and again, with trembling fingers. She could not
believe that the ring was gone, but she certainly could not feel it.
She was quite pale, and shook as if she had a chill. She was too
frightened to cry. Had she lost Aunt Comfort's ring--the real gold
ring she had given her for her name? She looked at the pin which Miss
Tabitha had quilted into the top of her pocket, but she dared not
take it out. Suppose Miss Tabitha should ask if she had, and she had
to tell her and be whipped? That would be almost worse than losing
the ring.

Comfort had never been whipped in her life, and her blood ran cold at
the thought of it.

She kept feeling wildly of the pocket. There was a little roll of