'Lisbeth stood stamping in the road; she stood stamping and crying as hard as she could, but even Dickon began running toward the mile-stone, and what could she do but turn around and run too? She could do nothing else. She ran as fast as her feet would take her, but her feet were tired. The boys' feet were not as tired; the most of them were bigger than hers; they were bigger and not so tired, so they ran faster.
'Lisbeth was left somewhere, I do not know where; left away off on the road carrying her flag, and trotting along at a great rate by herself. This was what she got by taking the boys. She sighed over her mistake, and she concluded that even Dickon would not have cared had she been packed in a bag, and, indeed, it seemed he did not.
To be sure Dickon remembered her after a while, and ran as fast as he could to find her, and see that she was all safe and give her a kiss under her funny little hat to make it all right. But 'Lisbeth felt herself hurt beyond measure, as well she might; only, if people will make mistakes they must take the consequences. If people will choose the boys when they should choose the girls, what can they expect; and if they will want to grow in London instead of wanting to grow where God put them, what can they expect? If we want to be very comfortable we must be contented where we find ourselves.
CHAPTER III.
The boys did not run very, very long before they saw the mill, and the steeple; they chased along the path in high glee after that, and did a great many things beside chasing along the path. But they all got home so long before the mothers came from the mill, that the mothers never knew that they had ever started for London until they were told. You may be sure they were glad that their boys had at length remembered what a naughty, foolish thing they were doing.
But how the girls laughed! You may well know that the girls were pleased enough to see the boys come back. They laughed because the boys had been silly enough to start, and they laughed because they pretended to be amused at their coming back after they had started, but you and I know that they were glad enough that they did come back.
As to 'Lisbeth, she held her head very high when the girls met her. She did not like being laughed at. They asked her a great many questions about London, and asked her why she did not stay, and how she liked the boys for company. It was very trying. Anybody but 'Lisbeth would have cried, or flown in a passion, but 'Lisbeth did not do either. So then the girls stopped laughing at her, and talked of something else. 'Lisbeth would not talk of anything else. She was not contented enough in the place where she grew to talk of anything else yet. She believed the girls would have done better than the boys; that she had made a mistake.
Everybody liked 'Lisbeth. She was not always doing naughty, foolish things like going to London, so the girls were ready to listen to her. She told them how the boys had behaved, and what she thought of them, and how determined she was to go to London, and how she believed that the girls would have behaved better, and invited them to start with her the very next day; and if there ever was a silly little girl in all the world, it was 'Lisbeth.