When I's the biggest I'll put Ruthie in _my_ sink." Very much comforted by this resolve, she dried her eyes and began to look about her for more housework.

"Let's me see; I'll pump a bushel o' water." There was a pail in the sink; so, what should she do but jump into that, and then jerk the pump-handle up and down, till a fine stream poured out and sprinkled her all over! "Sing a song, O sink-spout," sang she, catching her breath: but presently she began to feel cold.
"O, how it makes me _shivvle_!" said she.
"Katie!" called out a voice.
"Here me are!" gurgled the little one, her mouth under the pump-nose.
When Horace came in she was standing in water up to the tops of her long white stockings.

He took her out, wrung her a little, and set her on a shelf in the pantry to dry.
"Oho!" said she, shaking her wet plumage, like a duckling; "what for you look that way to me?
I didn't do nuffin,--not the leastest nuffin! The water kep' a comin' and a comin'." "Yes, you little naughty girl, and you kept pumping and pumping." "I'm isn't little naughty goorl," thought Katie, indignantly; "but Ruthie's naughty goorl, and Hollis _velly_ naughty goorl." "O, here you are, you little Hop-o'-my-thumb," said Mrs.Clifford, coming into the pantry; "a baby with a cough in her throat and pills in her pocket musn't get wet." Flyaway thrust her hand into her wet pocket to make sure the wee vial of white dots was still there.
"I fished her out of a pail of water," said Horace; "to-morrow I shall find her in a bird's nest." Mrs.Clifford sent for some fresh stockings and shoes.

Her baby-daughter was so often falling into mischief that she thought very little about it.

She did not know this was a remarkable occasion, and the baby had to-day begun to remember.