“Your hand, Miss March!” was the only answer her mute appeal received; and, too proud to cry or beseech, Amy set her teeth, threw back her head defiantly, and bore without flinching several tingling blows on her little palm.  They were neither many nor heavy, but that made no difference to her.  For the first time in her life she had been struck; and the disgrace, in her eyes, was as deep as if he had knocked her down.

“You will now stand on the platform till recess,” said Mr. Davis, resolved to do the thing thoroughly, since he had begun.

That was dreadful.  It would have been bad enough to go to her seat and see the pitying faces of her friends, or the satisfied ones of her few enemies; but to face the whole school with that shame fresh upon her seemed impossible, and for a second she felt as if she could only drop down where she stood, and break her heart with crying.  A bitter sense of wrong, and the thought of Jenny Snow, helped her to bear it; and taking the ignominious place, she fixed her eyes on the stove-funnel above what now seemed a sea of faces, and stood there so motionless and white, that the girls found it very hard to study, with that pathetic little figure before them.

During the fifteen minutes that followed, the proud and sensitive little girl suffered a shame and pain which she never forgot.  To others it might seem a ludicrous or trivial affair, but to her it was a hard experience; for during the twelve years of her life she had been governed by love alone, and a blow of that sort had never touched her before.  The smart of her hand, and the ache of her heart, were forgotten in the sting of the thought,—­“I shall have to tell at home, and they will be so disappointed in me!”

The fifteen minutes seemed an hour; but they came to an end at last, and the word “Recess!” had never seemed so welcome to her before.

“You can go, Miss March,” said Mr. Davis, looking, as he felt, uncomfortable.

He did not soon forget the reproachful look Amy gave him, as she went, without a word to any one, straight into the ante-room, snatched her things, and left the place “forever,” as she passionately declared to herself.  She was in a sad state when she got home; and when the older girls arrived, some time later, an indignation meeting was held at once.  Mrs. March did not say much, but looked disturbed, and comforted her afflicted little daughter in her tenderest manner.  Meg bathed the insulted hand with glycerine, and tears; Beth felt that even her beloved kittens would fail as a balm for griefs like this, and Jo wrathfully proposed that Mr. Davis be arrested without delay; while Hannah shook her fist at the “villain,” and pounded potatoes for dinner as if she had him under her pestle.

No notice was taken of Amy’s flight, except by her mates; but the sharp-eyed demoiselles discovered that Mr. Davis was quite benignant in the afternoon, and also unusually nervous.  Just before school closed Jo appeared, wearing a grim expression as she stalked up to the desk and delivered a letter from her mother; then collected Amy’s property and departed, carefully scraping the mud from her boots on the door-mat, as if she shook the dust of the place off her feet.