by; but in a few days you would be in as
much mischief as ever. It is better for you to be where some one can
take care of you. As soon as your mother is better you shall come home
again; and after a few days, I have no doubt but that you will be very
happy there with Aunt Emma and the new friends you will make."

"I don't believe Ruthy will like to go," said Ruby presently, after a
little thought.

"Ruthy is not going, my dear," answered her father.

"Oh, isn't Ruthy going?" asked Ruby, in surprise. "I thought of course
Ruthy would go if I did. Oh, papa, I can't go without Ruthy. I truly
can't. Won't you make her go with me? Please do; and then I will try
not to cry about going."

"I don't believe Ruthy's papa and mamma would want to spare her,"
answered the doctor. "But you will be with Aunt Emma, you know, dear;
and you love her, and she will take very good care of you."

"But I want Ruthy, too," Ruby said, looking very much as if she was
going to begin crying again at the thought of being separated, not only
from her father and mother, but from her little friend as well.

"Now Ruby, dear, if you are really sorry that you have been so
naughty," said her father, "you will show it by doing all you can to be
good now. If you fret and cry and worry about going to school, it will
make it very hard for your mother, and perhaps make her worse. If you
had been good, and tried to do what you knew would please her when she
was not able to watch you, it would not have been necessary to send you
away; but you have shown that you need some one to look after you, so
there does not seem to be any other way but this of giving your mother
a chance to get well without unnecessary anxiety; and of making sure
that you are not doing every wild thing that comes into your head. I
do not think Ruthy can go with you; so you must try to make the best of
things, and go with your Aunt Emma without complaining. If you will do
this, I shall know that you really love your mamma and want to do all
you can to make her better; and then just as soon as she is well, you
shall come home again."

Ruby was silent. It was a very hard way of showing that she was sorry,
she thought. She would rather have been shut up in her room, or go
without pie or almost anything else that she could think of, instead of
going away to boarding-school with Aunt Emma.

Much as she loved her aunt, she did not want to have to leave her
father and mother