But one day Patty overheard a visitor speaking of another child who was to undergo an operation. This visitor was one of the managers of St. Luke's Hospital, and the child she spoke of was a charity patient, a poor, little deformed girl in the public ward. She was an orphan, and had no friends except the kind people at the orphanage where she had been put when only a few months old.
Patty was very quiet until the visitor left; but when her mother turned to her sofa, she found her little daughter eager to tell her something.
"Oh, mother!" she cried, "I must see that little girl; I have something to tell her."
"I'll see her for you, dear," said Mrs. Lomax, "and tell her anything you say."
But Patty, who had been so reasonable and obedient, did not seem able to listen to reason. She wept, and entreated to be carried to the hospital, until at last her mother consented to let her go in a closed carriage with her father to lift her in and out, and carry her every step up and down the halls and stairway. "Only father," she said: "I'd rather have only father."
After all, the drive did not seem to hurt Patty at all; when she had taken off her wraps in the waiting room, and was being carried up to the ward, she whispered a little nervously: "Can I see the little girl all by myself, father?"
Mr. Lomax felt troubled at this almost stubborn secrecy. "I think not, daughter," he said gravely; "the nurse would hardly leave her patient in the hands of such a little girl as you. Why is it that you can't trust me to hear what you have to say?"
Patty hesitated a minute, and then said, "I'm so afraid that you might laugh at it, or say it was just a fancy; and, oh, I couldn't stand anybody's laughing, because it helped me so."
"Dear little girl," he said to himself. Then he answered Patty in a very gentle voice: "You need have no fear of that, darling. Now that I know how you feel about it, whatever you have to say will be very precious to me."