n she had ever done in
all her life put together before.

Ruby was having a very nice time this afternoon all by herself. It
would have been nicer to have had Ruthy to help her enjoy it, but Mrs.
Warren was not willing to let Ruthy go over to Mrs. Harper's, now that
there was no one to see what the two little girls were about. Ruthy
could be trusted not to get into any mischief by herself, but sometimes
she yielded to Ruby's coaxing when she had devised some piece of
mischief, and then no one knew what the two little girls would do next.

Some carpenters had been at work down by the stable, building a new
hen-house, and Ruby had made a playhouse for herself with the boards
they had left. She had leaned them up against the low branch of an old
tree, with Ann's help, for the boards were rather too heavy for her to
move alone, and so she had a tent-shaped house of boards in which she
thought it was great fun to play.

Ruby's favorite story was the "Swiss Family Robinson," and she thought
that no greater happiness could befall any one than to be cast away
upon a desert island. As long as there did not seem to be any prospect
of a desert island before her, when the largest piece of water she had
ever seen in her life was the small shallow pond where the boys got
water-lilies in summer, and skated in winter, she thought the next best
thing would be to live in this little house, and not go home at all,
except to see her mother.

She was very sure that the rest of the family would not approve of this
plan at all, so she did not say anything to them about it, but
determined to try it and see how she liked it, without running any
chances of being forbidden.

One day, when she knew Ann was busy up in her mother's room, and no one
would see what she was doing, she ran up to the garret, and brought
down a pair of blankets, an old comforter, and the little pillow that
belonged to the crib in which she had slept when she was a baby. She
carried all these out to her little playhouse in the yard, and has only
just tucked away the last corner of the comforter out of sight, when
she heard the sound of wheels as her father's buggy drove into the yard.

Ruby ran out to meet him, afraid that he might come and look into her
little wooden tent, and see what she had taken from the house. She was
very sure that he would not at all approve of her plan of spending the
night out there alone. She slipped her hand into his, and walked up