intended to run away.

Poor Rhoda was greatly distressed.

"You see, Rhoda dear," Tom said, "although we don't like leaving you,
you will really be happier when we are gone. It is a perpetual worry
to you to hear aunt going on, on, on--nagging, nagging, nagging for
ever and ever at us. She is fond of you and kind to you, and you
would get on quietly enough without us, while now she is in a fidget
whenever you are with us, and is constantly at you not to learn
mischief and bad ways from us. Besides you are always in a fright now,
lest we should get into some awful scrape, as I expect we should if
we stopped here. If it weren't for you, we should not let her off as
easily as we do. No, no, Rhoda, it is better for us all that we should
go."

Poor Rhoda, though she cried bitterly at the thought of losing her
brothers, yet could not but allow to herself that in many respects she
should be more happy when she was freed from anxiety, lest they should
get into some scrape, and when her aunt would not be kept in a state
of continued irritation and scolding. She felt too that, although she
herself could get on well enough in her changed life, that it was very
hard indeed for the boys, accustomed as they had been to the jolly and
independent life of a public school, and to be their own master during
the holidays, with their ponies, amusements, and their freedom to come
and go when they chose. Rhoda was a thoughtful child, and felt that
nothing that they could go through could do them more harm or make
them more unhappy than they now were. She had thought it all over day
after day, for she was sure that the boys would, sooner or later come
to it, and she had convinced herself that it was better for them.