CHAPTER IV.
CONSEQUENCES.
Ruby really had very good reason to be sorry for this last piece of naughtiness. By the time her papa carried her into the house they found that her mamma was very ill with the anxiety about Ruby, and her papa just let her kiss the white face once, and then he hurried her away to bed, so that he might do all that he could for the invalid.
Ruby was very much surprised to find every one up in the house. She had been so sure that it was nearly morning that she could not understand how it was that, after all she had been doing, and the long sleep she had had out in her little cabin, it should only be a little after ten o'clock.
It was some time before Ruby went to sleep, and in that quiet time she had a good opportunity to think how very naughty she had been. "I wish I had n't played Swiss Family Robinson," she said to herself. "I wish I had never, never heard anything about that old book. I should never have thought of it by myself, and then, of course, I would never have done such a thing. And now, it is just perfectly dreadful. I know papa thinks I have been too bad to love any more, and mamma is so sick, and Ann looked as cross at me as if she would just like to bite my head off, and I most know she will scold and scold at me to-morrow, and there, Aunt Emma had to come the first time I ever did such a thing, and now, I suppose she thinks I run away every night, and I never, never did before, and it is n't fair, so;" and Ruby cried softly. "Oh, dear, I do wish I had n't, and it don't make the least speck of difference how many times I wish I had n't now, 'cause it is too late. I wish I always knew beforehand how sorry I would be, and then I would n't do things that make me feel so dreadful bad. I wish I knew how mamma is. If she was n't sick, she would come and love me, and make me feel better; she always does when I have been doing things. It is n't my fault if I do bad things. When my mamma's sick, how can I help doing things. I should n't think anybody would 'spect me to mind Ann, cause she's so cross, and anyway she is n't my mamma, so she need n't pretend that she can tell me when I must n't do things. I won't let anybody but my mamma tell me what I must n't do, 'cept maybe my papa. I think it will be too bad for people to scold me for going out to-night, when I never had one bit a nice time. I can tell Ruthy I went, though, anyway, and she will be just as 'sprised, and she will say, 'I don't see how you ever dared, Ruby Harper.' Ruthy would n't dare go out in the dark. She is a real little 'fraid-cat, that is what she is. I 'm glad I am not so 'fraid of everything."
Ruby flounced about upon her pillow. She wanted to find fault with some one else, so as not to have to listen to what her conscience was telling her about herself, but it was not of much use to try to find fault with gentle little Ruthy. Ruby knew that even if she had not been afraid of going out in the dark, she would never have done anything that she knew would make her mamma and papa feel so badly. Ruthy did things sometimes that she ought not to do, and sometimes forgot her tasks, but it was rarely, if ever, that she deliberately planned a piece of mischief; and if she was concerned in one, it was almost always because Ruby had coaxed her into it.
"If Ann was n't so cross, I don't believe I would do so many things," Ruby went on, still trying to find some one else to blame. "I never did so many things when mamma was well. I am going to ask her to send Ann away, 'cause it is her fault."
But Ruby know better than that. It was because she was so very sure that it had been all her fault that she had done something that she had known perfectly well would displease her mamma and papa if they should know it, and that had worried her papa and made her mamma worse, that she was so anxious to lay the blame upon some one else.
She turned her pillow over and over, and thumped it at last, she grew so impatient because she could not go to sleep.
"I don't think it is very pleasant to stay awake all night, and keep thinking about things," she said. "Oh, dearie me, I do wish I was asleep. I wonder if people think when they are asleep. They can't tell whether they do think or not, I s'pose, 'cause they 're asleep and don't know it. I wish I was asleep, anyway. I wish I had n't gone down into that yard. I guess I do know I ought n't to have done it, and I am just as sorry as I can be. I could n't be any more sorry if papa should call me Rebecca Harper, and scold me like everything, and if mamma should scold me, too. I guess I won't say anything even if Ann scolds me, for I know I ought not to have done such a dreadful thing. Suppose I had been all burned up; and that is just what would have happened if my papa had not come! I wonder how he happened to come down into the yard and see the fire. I never s'posed he would come. I thought I was just going to be all burned up, so I did. Was n't it dreadful to be so close to a fire, and not be able to get away? I would have been all burned up by this time, and my house would have been all burned up, too, and no one would ever have known what became of me. Mamma would always have said, 'I wonder where Ruby could possibly have gone, and why she never, never comes home,' and papa would worry and worry, and Ruthy would have been so lonely, and they would never, never have known."
At the thought of such sad consequences to her mischief, Ruby cried a little, and before her tears had dried, she was fast asleep, so she did not know how ill her mamma was all night, nor how great had been the consequences of her mischief.
In the morning when Ruby waked up, she found Ann by her bedside.
"Here is your breakfast," said Ann, putting down a tray with Ruby's bowl of bread and milk upon it, on a little table. "Your papa says you are to stay here till he comes up and lets you out. Oh, Ruby, how could you be so naughty and worry your poor mamma? You don't know how sick you made her with your cutting up."
Ann did not speak angrily, but she seemed to feel so badly about Mrs. Harper's illness that Ruby felt very subdued and did not try to defend herself as usual.
"I don't want to stay up here. I want to go down and eat my breakfast with Aunt Emma," she said, presently, turning her head away, so Ann might not see the tears which were coming into her eyes.
"Your papa said you must stay up here," Ann repeated, and without saying anything more, she went out, and Ruby heard the bolt slide, and knew that she was a prisoner.
"I don't like to be locked in. I just won't be," she said angrily; and she thought she would jump up and go and pound at the door until some one should come to unfasten it; but then she remembered how sick Ann had said her mamma was, and she knew that a noise would disturb her; and more than that,—it would make her feel so badly to know that Ruby was in a temper.
There was something else that Ruby remembered, too. The last time her papa had told her to stay in her own room till he should come to let her out, he had trusted her and had not fastened the door; and when he went upstairs, he had found that Ruby had gone out, and was down in the yard playing with her kitten, just as if she was not in disgrace; so it was no wonder that he could not trust her this time. Ruby sat down on the side of the bed very meekly when she remembered all this, and I am glad to say, really resolved that as far as she could she would make up for having been so naughty last night, by trying to be as good as possible now, and not give any more trouble to her mother.
Downstairs her father and Aunt Emma were eating their breakfast, and her father was saying sadly,—
"I am sure I don't know what to do with the child. I am so busy with my patients that I can hardly take the time to be with her mother as much as I should be, and Ann does not seem to be able to make her mind. I know she is always getting into mischief, and she certainly does seem to think of more extraordinary things to do than any child I ever knew. She might have been badly burned last night, if I had not seen the blaze, and even if she had escaped herself, the fire might have spread to the boards and fence, and then there is no knowing where it would have stopped. Her mother will never get well while she worries about Ruby, and you see for yourself what harm last night worry did her. I declare I don't know what to do."
"I have a plan," said Aunt Emma, after a little thought. "I will take Ruby back to school with me."