She might build fires upon any of the stumps or logs, but not within certain limits of distance from the house, lest she should set the house on fire.

And she must not touch the axe, for fear that she might cut herself, nor climb upon the wood-pile, for fear that it might fall down upon her.

With some such restrictions as these, she could do whatever she pleased.
She was very much delighted, one morning in September, when she was playing around the house in her working frock, at finding a great hole or hollow under a stump, which she immediately resolved to have for her oven.

She was sitting down upon the ground by the side of it, and she began to call out as loud as she could, "Mary Erskine! Mary Erskine!" But Mary Erskine did not answer.

Mary Bell could hear the sound of the spinning-wheel in the house, and she wondered why the spinner could not hear her, when she called so loud.
She listened, watching for the pauses in the buzzing sound of the wheel, and endeavored to call out in the pauses,--but with no better success than before.