This is a chapter book probably written in the 1970's; I think I read it in elementary school. There is some event in the girl's home (new baby?) that requires her to go spend the summer (I think) with a relative. She does not want to go, and when she arrives at her destination (by bus, maybe) there has been some confusion and the relative does not pick her up. She runs away and hides herself in a thicket of some sort; she drinks from people's garden hoses (once a man yells at her for being in his yard); once she goes to church and a woman expresses concern at her bedraggled appearance and bruises. I don't remember how she gets food. I'm pretty sure at the end she is reunited with her family.