"But then you will go away, too, you know," Ruthy suggested.
"I wish I would n't; I wish I was going to stay here for a week after she went," Ruby answered. "I think Aunt Emma might stop her, I do so."
"How do you mean?" asked Ruthy.
"Well, I know what I would do," said Ruby. "I would say to her this way—" and Ruby held her head very high, and tried to look exceedingly dignified—"I should say, 'Miss Abigail, if you will please tend to making Ruby's dresses, I will tend to her behavior.'"
Ruthy looked rather shocked.
"I am afraid that would make Miss Abigail feel dreadfully bad, to have your auntie say such a thing," she said. "I think Miss Abigail is real nice, I truly do. She saves pretty pieces of calico for my patch-work, and once she gave me a sash for my doll; don't you remember it?—that blue one, with a little rose bud in the middle."
"Well, I don't like her," and Ruby shook her shoulders. "And I don't think it's nice in you to like her, when she makes me perfectly miserable. How would you like it if every time you wanted to do anything you heard her calling you, and had to go in and be fitted and fitted. She holds pins in her mouth, too, a whole row of them, and mamma never lets me do that, so Miss Abigail ought not to, and I just think I will tell her so. She has a whole row of them, just as long as her mouth is wide, and they bristle straight out when she talks. Just suppose she should drop some down my neck when she is talking. They would stick in to me, and hurt me like everything before I could get them out. I guess I would n't like that, would I? And if you had to stand just hours and hours, and have her cold fingers poking around your neck, and those great sharp scissors going snip, snip all around your neck, just where they would cut great pieces out if you dared move, I don't believe you would like that yourself, Ruthy Warren, even if she did give you things for your doll."
"No, I don't s'pose I would like it any better than you do," assented Ruthy, who was determined not to quarrel with her little friend, when they were so soon to be separated.
"Ruby, Miss Abigail wants you," called Aunt Emma.
Ruby made a wry face.