Chapter III: Part 3

"I don’t know." It struck Peggy, as she replied, that all she knew of Elaine’s affairs was singularly inadequate to account for the weary, disillusioned look which was the other girl’s habitual expression. "You know they used to be quite well off," Peggy explained, as Graham helped her move a table which was taking up more than its share of the room. "I guess it’s more comfortable never to have much, than to have it and lose it."

It was not till after one o’clock that everything was ready. The fancy work tables were in the front room, and the display proved that the loyalty of the Terrace girls to a good cause was not of the flash-in-the-pan variety. Many days of hard work were represented on those crowded tables, and, though the skill of the workers varied, the average was commendable. Elaine’s collar had the place of honor, with a background of black velvet to set off its delicately intricate pattern. In the back parlor were the candy and ice-cream tables, as well as the little tea-table, over which Priscilla was to preside, the latter being a concession to the old ladies who no longer possessed a "sweet tooth," and who shivered at the suggestion of ice cream in November.

The girls flew home to swallow a hasty dinner, without any very definite idea as to what they were eating, and then hurried themselves into their best clothes, and were back again a good half-hour before the advertised time for opening the Bazar. "From three to ten" the announcements had read, and when the grandfather’s clock in the hall struck the first-named hour there was a general craning of necks, as if with the expectation of seeing a procession of patrons ascending the front steps. Nobody was in sight, however, and some faces assumed an expression of anxiety.

"Three o’clock and not a soul here," Ruth said tragically. "O, dear! I hope that somebody’ll come after we’ve all worked so hard."

"There’s a splendid concert at the Lyric this afternoon. I shouldn’t wonder if that took a great many people who might have come here," observed Priscilla, with an air of being prepared for the worst.

"I thought all the time, that we should have some hand-bills," Amy exclaimed. "You tell people, and you put up notices in the drugstore, but that isn’t enough. There ought to be hand-bills distributed the night before."

The spirits of the company were rapidly approaching the zero point when Peggy came to the rescue with one of her sunny suggestions, which appreciably raised the temperature. "Why, it’s only three o’clock. People never come exactly on time to things of this sort." Then she recounted Dorothy’s latest escapade and set them all to laughing.

But when the hands of the clock pointed to twenty minutes past three, Peggy’s utmost efforts were unequal to the task of keeping up the spirits of the little crowd. Various explanations were advanced for the failure of the Bazar. Peggy’s opinion was asked as to whether or not Murvin would take back the ice cream. And then the atmosphere of gloom was dissipated by the sound of the door-bell.

It was an old lady whom Dick Raymond, acting door-keeper, admitted to the Bazar, a rather shabby old lady, who walked with a limp, and had a market basket on her arm. It is doubtful whether her arrival would have been regarded as an important event anywhere outside of Mrs. Wylie’s parlors. But at the sight of her rusty black bonnet the creases suddenly vanished from anxious faces and dimples appeared in their stead. She was the first arrival, and possessed all the mysterious charm that attaches itself to the first blue-bird or the first violet.

She was an appreciative old lady, too. She referred to the hand-painted paper-dolls, which formed the major part of Priscilla’s contribution, as "pretty little images," and admired some crocheted wash-cloths, with pink edges, under the impression that they were a substantial sort of doily. Only when her attention was called to a drawnwork handkerchief did she become critical.

"Mine gets holes in ’em fast enough without beginnin’ that way," said the old lady, laughing heartily at her own wit, and everybody laughed in sympathy. She wound up her exhaustive examination of all the articles displayed by the purchase of a holder and five cents’ worth of peanut brittle. As she limped down the steps she met three or four ladies coming up, but not one of them elicited the enthusiasm which had been the spontaneous tribute to the first arrival.

By quarter after four the rooms were buzzing, and busy as Elaine was, she found opportunity to admire the resourcefulness of Peggy. It was Peggy who soothed the feelings of the girl who thought that they should have charged more for her bureau scarf, and who propitiated the patron who felt that she had paid more than was right for a hem-stitched towel. It was Peggy who came to the assistance of a perplexed "saleslady" who could not think how much change was due her customer, and who took charge of wrapping some peculiarly obstinate article, and it was also Peggy who found, for the lady who was aggrieved over discovering that something she wanted had been sold to another purchaser, a similar article which suited her just as well. Peggy seemed to have the faculty of being every where at once. She was equal to all the little crises of the occasion.

"I don’t see how you manage it," Elaine said to her during a temporary lull in the proceedings, late in the afternoon. Compliments were rare on Elaine’s lips, and Peggy, looking up, had no idea that she was being complimented. "Manage what?" she asked.

"O, helping everybody out, and smoothing everybody down, and the queer part is that you keep so cheerful about it."

Peggy smiled a little.

"The queer part, as you call it, is really the secret, if I’ve got any secret. If you keep cheerful and are polite, and don’t lose your head, it’s easy enough to get other folks to see things the way you do."

By six o’clock the girls were tired but triumphant. Peggy’s cheery prophesies had been more than realized, and from eight to ten they were sure of another period of activity, which would, in all probability, empty their tables and fill their treasury. The workers hurried home for a supper, even more of a form than dinner had been, and were back on duty before there was any chance of new arrivals.

On the cheerful group, comparing notes as to the day’s experiences and calculating the probable gains, by methods which brought startlingly diverse results, Ruth descended like a whirlwind. "Girls, the ice cream’s gone."

"Gone!" echoed a blank chorus, and Peggy, as usual the first to rally, exclaimed, "Why, I don’t see how that can be. We didn’t have--"

"No, no, you don’t understand," cried poor Ruth, wringing her hands. "We only used one freezer of ice cream this afternoon. But the other one, the big one, has disappeared."

"Stolen!" Priscilla gasped. "Well, anybody who’s mean enough to steal from empty-stocking children!"

"That’ll cut down our profits dreadfully," groaned Amy.

Peggy roused herself. "Maybe there’s some mistake," she cried. "It almost seems as if there _must_ be some mistake. Let’s look outside."

There was a rush for the back door, despite Graham Wylie’s philosophical suggestion that a ten-quart ice cream freezer was a difficult thing to mislay. The November night was starless and chilly, and most of the girls, after taking a disconsolate view of the landscape, withdrew shivering to the warmth within, to bemoan their misfortune. Perhaps Peggy found it harder to give up than most people do. She went down the walk to the alley, Graham following.

"It’s such a big thing," observed Peggy over her shoulder, "that you wouldn’t think it could get very far without attracting attention. You don’t suppose--"

"Sh!" warned Graham suddenly, and both went forward on tiptoe. Further up the alley sounded a curious bumping noise. A murmur of voices broke the hush of the night.

Graham felt for the bolt of the back gate, found it already drawn, and smiled, well pleased. The voices outside were audible by now.

"Say, that’s far enough."

"’Tain’t far enough till it’s inside, kid. You don’t s’pose they’s goin’ to look fer ice cream in no alley, do you?"

Something bumped against the gate. Slowly it opened, and a capped head appeared. Then Graham pounced; there was a thud and a wild scampering, and Peggy flew to the rescue of the overturned freezer.

The two small boys who had walked into the trap were no match for the young collegian, who was training for the hundred yard dash next field day. If the boys had run in the same direction he would have had them both, but as one went east and the other west, he was obliged to make a choice. He came back holding at arm’s length an urchin whose squirmings were the most extraordinary display of agility that Peggy could remember to have witnessed.

"Don’t try to carry that freezer," exclaimed Graham, as he returned with his struggling captive. "We’ll send some of the boys out for it. And now let’s come inside and see what we’ve got here."

Graham’s captive proved to be a small boy with carroty hair, innumerable freckles, and a square chin, which, at this moment, seemed possessed of sufficient stubbornness to equip a regiment. His coat had at one time been too large for him, but had been fitted to his diminutive person by cutting the sleeves off at the elbows and pinning the surplus of the back over into a large plait by means of safety pins. His shoes were so large that Peggy no longer wondered at the peculiar flapping echo of the footsteps heard in the alley.

"Well, you young scamp!" Graham held his captive under the chandelier and scowled down upon him impressively. "You’re making a nice early start, you are. Do you know where you’re likely to end up, if you keep on this way?"

If the boy knew, he had no intention of telling. To all appearances he was both deaf and dumb. His mouth had become a straight, rather bluish line, above his defiant little chin.

"No tongue, eh? Well, I guess we can find a way to make you talk. Just step to the ’phone, one of you," added Graham over his shoulder, "and call up the police station."

There was a chorus of protests.

"O, no, Graham. He’s so little."

"And we’ve got the ice cream back, Graham, so no harm’s done."

Peggy flung herself into the discussion. "Why, Graham, he was bringing it back."

"Bringing it back," sneered Graham. "Why should he steal it, and then bring it back?" The logic was irresistible, but Peggy was a girl who never allowed logic to stand in the way of her facts.

"I don’t know. But I know he was bringing it back. They were way up the alley when we heard them first, and they’d got to the gate and had it open, when you jumped at them."

The lids of the small prisoner fluttered, lifted, and dropped again, but in that instant a glance had sped straight as an arrow to Peggy. The eyes had uttered an appeal which the stubborn lips would not speak.

"You were bringing it back, weren’t you?" Peggy exclaimed. "Tell us about it."

The boy squirmed, cast another furtive glance at Peggy, and seemed to find encouragement in her air of sympathetic attention. His mouth opened; and a hoarse voice exploded two words, as if they had been cannon crackers.

"Skinny said--" Then, apparently overcome by the effect of his beginning, he came to a full stop.

"That’s right," Peggy encouraged him. "What was it Skinny said?"

Another period of squirming, as if the small figure were a corkscrew set to remove some obstruction to the free flow of speech, and as if a cork had really popped out, the explanation bubbled forth at last.

"Skinny said you was gettin’ money for the empty stockin’ kids, an’ so--"

"And so you brought it back," exclaimed Peggy, including the entire company in her triumphant glance.

"Yes, Miss. I uster go to them shows myself," said the boy with an air suggesting that his youth was at least a score of years behind him. "They’s all right, they is."

There was a certain honesty about the boy’s manner, in spite of the transgression in which he had been detected, and this, coupled with the undeniable fact that he was returning the ice cream freezer when captured, resulted in a reversal of public sentiment. Little kindly murmurs passed from one to another, and even Graham did not have the heart to make further references to the police. "Well, youngster," he said gruffly, "guess you’d better skip. And just remember that you won’t get off so easy the next time."

The boy’s instantaneous acceptance of the permission had carried him as far as the next room when he was checked by Peggy. "Wait a minute," she cried, "I’ve got something for you." She met Graham’s air of disapproving inquiry with a suggestion of defiance. "I’m going to give him a little ice cream," she explained.

"Well, I like that!" Graham was plainly indignant. "He’s lucky not to be in the lock-up, and here you are petting and pampering him. That’s just like a girl. You know perfectly," he scolded, as Peggy dished out the ice cream with a liberal hand, "that people who do things of that sort ought to be made to smart for it."

"I don’t know," said Peggy over her shoulder. "Nobody made you smart when you Sophomores stole the ice cream at the Freshman banquet."

"O, that!" exclaimed Graham, reddening. "That was different."

"Yes," Peggy acknowledged generously, "It was different. As far as I know, you never took it back." And with this parting shot she carried the well-filled saucer to the boy waiting at the kitchen door.

The rapidity with which the ice cream disappeared was startling, to say the least. As a half-starved dog bolts his rations of raw meat so Peggy’s protégé gulped down pink wedges of the unyielding dainty in a manner suggesting that his digestive apparatus must be of a peculiar and improved pattern. When the saucer was scraped clean he rolled his eyes in Peggy’s direction in a manner which might have been intended to indicate gratitude, or which might be preliminary to a seizure of some kind.

"Do you feel all right?" asked Peggy in alarm.

"You bet," the hoarse voice assured her, adding, as an afterthought, "That stuff’s out of sight."

Peggy forebore to explain that the rapidity with which the delicacy in question had been put out of sight was the ground of her uneasiness. "What is your name?" she inquired.

"Jimmy Dunn." The gray eyes met her own squarely and she was confirmed in her opinion that they were honest eyes.

"Well, Jimmy, it wasn’t right for you to take our ice cream, but it was very--" Peggy searched for a word in the boy’s vocabulary--"It was very white of you to bring it back. I like you and I hope I’ll see you again. Good night."

The door swung ajar and the queer, ungainly little figure slipped through the opening. Then it turned. "Same to you," said the hoarse voice, and Peggy heard the big shoes clatter on the walk, as the wearer raced to the gate. And though that was the most successful Bazar the girls of the Terrace had ever held, and the spirit of self-congratulation ran high, perhaps the pleasantest memory that Peggy carried home with her was that exchange of compliments on the back doorsteps.

*CHAPTER VIII*

*AT HOME WITH THE DUNNS*

"I can’t," said Peggy. "I’ve got to make a call after school."

Priscilla, who had suggested a trip to the public library, to look up some of the history references for the next day, glanced at her friend askance. "O," she said in a voice of deep meaning, "I can’t imagine what you see in that Elaine Marshall."

"Can’t you?" Peggy’s tone was cheery.

"O, she’s well enough. But to choose her for an intimate friend! You’re the only one of us who really likes her, you know."

"It’s lucky I like her so much, then," suggested Peggy, still reprehensibly cheerful.

"O, yes, it’s lucky for her. Nobody would deny that. But as far as you’re concerned, Peggy, I don’t know. Of course the more intimate you get with her, the less you see-- Now, Peggy Raymond, I’d like to know what you’re laughing at."

Peggy’s pent-up chuckle had broken in on the conversation with rather startling effect. As a tease, Peggy was not an unqualified success, since she never had the heart to carry her teasing to the climax. "I was only laughing at your dragging Elaine into it," she explained blithely. "I’m not going to see her. I’m going to call on the Dunns."

Priscilla wavered between offence and curiosity. Peggy tipped the balance by giving her friend’s arm a good-natured squeeze.

"The Dunns," repeated Priscilla hastily, as if glad to get away from the previous topic of conversation. "Where do they live?"

"Glen Echo Avenue."

"Pretty name, but I don’t know it."

"It’s over across the tracks, just beyond."

"Why, Peggy Raymond, I didn’t suppose anybody lived over there."

"Lots of people do. Scads of ’em."

"I didn’t mean that, Peggy. Of course, I meant the kind of people one goes to see.

"I never went to see these people before," Peggy admitted. "But I’ve wanted to ever since the night of the Bazar. That boy, you know--"

"O, the ice cream boy! Was he a Dunn?"

"Jimmy Dunn. I saw him on the street the other day, and asked him where he lived. He’s an awful little rag-bag, and Graham Wylie calls him all sorts of names, but there’s something about him I can’t help liking. And I thought I’d see what sort of woman his mother was. Sometimes we have an extra woman in to scrub, at house-cleaning time, though I must say," Peggy concluded thoughtfully, "that judging from Jimmy, she wouldn’t be much of a success as a scrubber."

"I’ll go with you," Priscilla said, taking Peggy’s arm. "It isn’t a suitable neighborhood for you to go alone." Now that she had learned that Peggy was not planning to call upon Elaine, Priscilla’s mood had become extremely affectionate. She pressed the arm she held. She complimented the way Peggy was doing her hair. While she did not acknowledge to herself that her impulse to be agreeable had its root in the knowledge that she had just been very disagreeable, Peggy recognized her friend’s unusual demonstrativeness as an effort at atonement, and she met her half way.

An idealist of the most pronounced type must have christened Glen Echo Avenue. The objects on the landscape most closely resembling glens, were the grimy coal-sheds along the track, while it would have been hard for a professional riddle-guesser to say why the little twisting, squalid street should have been dignified with the name of avenue. A goat, with oblique, uncanny eyes, occupied apparently in the mastication of a paper bag, gazed at the girls as they passed, and swarms of dirty children paused in their play to take stock of the strangers.

"Does Mrs. Dunn live anywhere around here?" Peggy inquired, addressing a curly-haired little girl with enormous black eyes, and gold rings in her ears. Another girl, with fiery red hair, pushed forward.

"Mary can’t understand English,": she explained importantly. "She’s a dago and her folks ain’t been here long. Who are you looking for?"

"I want to find Mrs. Dunn, Jimmy Dunn’s mother."

A babel of shrill voices at once gave directions, which the pointing forefingers rendered unnecessary. As Peggy descended the steps which led to the Dunn’s front door, placed, for some inexplicable reason, some feet below the street level, she reflected that in Glen Echo Avenue the name of Jimmy Dunn had proved effective. She was about to knock, when the red-haired girl pushed by and opened the door.

"Mis’ Dunn," she screamed. "O, Mis’ Dunn, you got company. Come right along," she added, looking over her shoulder. The girls followed as she led the way, uncomfortably aware that all the children from the street were crowding in after them, apparently resolved to lose no detail of the interview.

Mrs. Dunn was seated by the kitchen stove, with a baby in her arms. She was a flabby woman, with a double chin, which seemed superfluous, considering that poor Jimmy had scarcely flesh enough to cover one chin respectably. She eyed her callers with an air more hostile than hospitable.

"If you’re lookin’ for somebody to wash," she said abruptly, "’tain’t no use comin’ here. My health don’t allow of more than rubbin’ out a few pieces for the children."

Peggy explained that their call was purely social, and Mrs. Dunn’s manner lost its cold aloofness.

"Isabel," she exclaimed, addressing a freckled child whom Peggy knew at a glance must be one of Jimmy’s sisters, "clean off some chairs for the young ladies. Set the potatoes behind the stove. The kindlings might as well go under the bed. ’Liza," she added to the red-haired girl, who, with her usual officiousness, was lending a hand, "now there’s a tea-towel hanging up over the sink; take that, some o’ you, and dust the chairs off good. No, don’t bother about the rungs, Estelle. They ain’t going to set on the rungs, be they? Some o’ you don’t use the sense you was born with."

And so amid a confusion in which Mrs. Dunn sat calm and unperturbed, giving her orders, two chairs were cleared and the girls seated themselves. Peggy, who had discovered that a baby is always a safe entering wedge as a topic of conversation, ventured to pat the round cheek of the child in Mrs. Dunn’s arms. "That’s a nice fat baby, Mrs. Dunn," she said, and the compliment was not a careless bid for the mother’s favor. To Peggy all babies were nice, though some were nicer. This baby was too dirty to admit of the comparative degree, though he was surprisingly plump considering his surroundings.

Mrs. Dunn groaned.

"He may look fat enough, but I’ve been up with him night and day all winter," she said. "Amonia of the lungs ’twas, and the mumps first of November. So much nursin’ is bad for me on account of my heart."

"Do you have heart trouble?" asked Peggy, alarmed.

"Yes, Miss. But that’s not the worst. I’ve got a disease that will take me off some day, I s’pose." She lowered her voice thrillingly. "Lots of folks die of it. You’ll see by the papers. It’s complication."

"Complication!" Peggy and Priscilla exchanged glances.

"Complication," repeated Mrs. Dunn, as if determined to make no concessions. "I guess it’s pretty near the most fatal of any. You can buy things at any drug store to cure consumption and amonia of the lungs, but there ain’t a cure for complication. I ast the druggist myself and he said he didn’t know of none."

Peggy attempted to change the subject to something less depressing. "I don’t suppose Jimmy is home?"

"No, Miss. He’s off sellin’ papers."

"He’s left school, has he? It’s a pity, for he seems so bright."

"Jimmy’s been through the fourth grade," said Mrs. Dunn. "He can read well enough for anybody. And Francesca, she pretty near finished the fourth grade, too, and she’s in the factory now. In the spring they’re going to give her a machine."

"Isn’t she pretty young? I thought they weren’t allowed to work in the factory till--"

"Francesca got a permit," explained Mrs. Dunn, "’count of her pa being out of a job."

"Do you mean that Mr. Dunn hasn’t any work at all?" exclaimed Peggy. "Do you have to live on what those two children earn?" Mrs. Dunn plainly expanded under the sympathetic interest.

"This is gettin’ to be such a country that a man can’t earn an honest living," she said. "Mr. Dunn’s an awful smart man. He can turn his hand to most anything, but these Eytalians and other furren folks is comin’, and takin’ away all the jobs. The doctor told me last week that I’d ought to get some medicine to make my complication a little easier, but I haven’t had a cent to spare for it. Seems as if it took all Jimmy and Francesca make to keep us in coal, and pay the rent." She looked thoughtfully in the direction of Peggy’s pocket-book, which had a somewhat plump appearance owing to Peggy’s habit of cutting recipes and poems out of the newspaper and tucking them away in her pocketbook to show the other girls.

What embarrassing turn the conversation might have taken next it is impossible to say for it was interrupted suddenly by the entrance of a young woman. She was a trim and business-like young woman who betrayed no surprise at the social aspect of Mrs. Dunn’s kitchen, and who declined Peggy’s offer of a chair, with a pleasant little smile.

"Can’t stay long enough to sit down," she said briskly. "I’ve been down to the works, Mrs. Dunn, and I find that Mr. Dunn hasn’t been there since a week ago Monday."

Mrs. Dunn turned so darkly red that Peggy wondered if the mysterious and dread disease "complication" could by any chance be allied to apoplexy.

"The work down there’s too hard for him," she said sharply. "He ain’t as strong as he looks, Mr. Dunn ain’t. And the foreman’s always picking on him."

The young woman shook her business-like head. "Come, Mrs. Dunn," she said, "the worst of Mr. Dunn’s troubles is laziness, and the reason he had difficulty with the foreman was that he wouldn’t attend to business. Now we are ready to help you, if you show a disposition to help yourselves, but there will be no more relief till Mr. Dunn goes back to work."

Peggy and Priscilla were feeling out of place. They rose murmuring something which might have been an apology for their abrupt departure, or a promise to come again. Mrs. Dunn paid little attention to their going, and it was the red-haired girl who ushered them to the door.

"That’s the charity lady," she explained, with evident satisfaction in her superior knowledge. "She’s all the time comin’ to the Dunns. She don’t never come to our home, ’less somebody’s sick or dies, or something like that. My pa he sticks to his job, and Mr. Dunn don’t, that’s why."

"I wonder what that is," Peggy cried, losing interest in the red-haired girl’s explanation, as she caught sight of something resembling a football scrimmage at the entrance to Glen Echo Avenue.

"Guess the boys are havin’ a little fight about something," said the red-haired girl carelessly, and indeed none of the residents of the avenue seemed to take more than a superficial interest in the cluster of struggling bodies, from which proceeded outcries of the most blood-curdling nature. Only the goat which the girls had previously noticed, seemed to share their apprehensions, for it cantered past, a desperate expression in its oblique, wicked eyes, indicating a determination to put as much distance as possible between itself and the scene of the disturbance.

The group broke up as Peggy and Priscilla drew near, and proved to be composed of a score or so of boys, ranging in ages from six to fifteen. Some were grinning and some looked angry. And one was crying. The last was the central figure of the group, and he limped as he approached the sidewalk. His nose was bleeding so profusely as to make his appearance distinctly ghastly, and Peggy fumbled for her handkerchief. Then she uttered an exclamation.

"It’s Jimmy! Priscilla, it is Jimmy Dunn!"

Jimmy’s tears dissolved in a smile startlingly friendly. "I got it," he exclaimed and held forth a wet, dirty and uninviting object, whose proximity caused Priscilla to take a hasty backward step. "What is it?" she exclaimed in horror.

"It’s a kitten, I think," Peggy replied doubtfully. "Yes, it is a kitten." Her uncertainty was less singular because the appearance of the poor bedraggled creature was so little suggestive of the kittens Peggy had known. Jimmy Dunn, however, regarded his prize with unalloyed satisfaction. "They was going to drown it, them smart kids," he said with a gesture that included all his late antagonists. "But they didn’t. I got it. And that ain’t all, you bet." Jimmy’s voice took on a portentous hoarseness. "I can’t lick ’em all to onct, but every kid in that bunch is going to get _his_, and don’t you forgit it."

"I’m afraid you’re hurt yourself, Jimmy," Peggy said, proffering her handkerchief. Jimmy shook his head and fell back on his sleeve.

"But you were crying," Priscilla suggested with less than Peggy’s tact.

Jimmy Dunn looked a little sheepish.

"I mostly bawl when I get mad," he replied. "Seems as if I couldn’t put up a good fight till I start cryin’. I’m going to the store and get a cent’s worth o’ milk for this kitten. Time it’s dry and cleaned up, and had some milk to drink, you wouldn’t know it."

Peggy thought it was very likely. It was impossible to imagine how any kitten dry, warm and fed, could bear even the faintest resemblance to the wet, muddy lump of fur in Jimmy’s arms. Thinking it advisable that measures of resuscitation should begin as promptly as possible, the two girls said good-bye and walked on, hearing till they left Glen Echo Avenue far behind the shrill tones of Jimmy Dunn’s voice as he called to his late opponents promises of retribution in the near future.

"Mrs. Dunn is a little disappointing," Peggy observed at last. "She doesn’t seem quite--sincere." That was as severe as Peggy could very well be on short acquaintance. "But as for Jimmy," she went on with sudden enthusiasm, "that boy’s got lots of good in him."

And in both particulars Priscilla agreed with her.

*CHAPTER IX*

*PEGGY ACTS AS CRITIC*

Peggy’s thoughts, busy with plans for the relief of the Dunn family, were turned abruptly into another channel at the supper-table. "O, by the way, Peggy," her mother said, "you had a caller this afternoon, Mrs. Summerfield Ely."

"She came in a naughty-mobeel," exclaimed Dorothy, almost choking over the long word in her eagerness to get it out before anybody else had a chance.

"My! Doesn’t she think she’s swell," scoffed Dick. "Fur coat and a dress that trails." Of all manifestations of feminine vanity a trained gown called forth from Dick the most outspoken expressions of contempt.

"It seems," explained Mrs. Raymond, ignoring her son’s outburst, "that she was at your Bazar, and bought a collar, Irish lace, I believe."

"O, yes, mother. That was Elaine’s collar. I was a little worried for fear nobody would buy it, but not because it wasn’t nice enough. I was afraid it was _too_ nice. Lots of people come to our Bazar with just about fifty cents to spend, and I was sure the price of the collar would look dreadfully big to nearly everybody. But we really couldn’t mark it less than it was worth."

"Certainly not," agreed Mrs. Raymond.

"And then Mrs. Summerfield Ely came in, and I was sure the collar was as good as sold, for it was really the nicest thing there, mother. Just as soon as I could get the chance I called her attention to it, and she looked at it a minute through her lorgnette--"

"O, say," sneered Dick, "why doesn’t she wear spectacles if she needs ’em?"

"And she said right off, ’I’ll take that,’" continued Peggy tranquilly; "I was so glad, especially on Elaine’s account. It makes you feel horrid to put lots of work into a thing and have it left over."

Having relieved her mind, Peggy was now ready to listen to other people. "What did Mrs. Ely want of me, mother?"

"She wants to order a pair of cuffs to match the collar. She wasn’t sure who did the work, but she thought you could tell her. I am very glad," added Mrs. Raymond, "for, of course, she will pay a good price, and, from what you tell me, I fancy that Elaine needs the money. Why, what are you going to do, Peggy?"

The impulsive Peggy, starting up from her unfinished supper, flushed guiltily and sat down again. "I was going to run over and tell Elaine," she confessed. "But I suppose the news will keep."

As it turned out, it was not till the next afternoon that Peggy found an opportunity to convey to her next-door neighbor the important information of Mrs. Summerfield Ely’s order. Callers came before supper was over, and by the time they left the lights in the next house were extinguished. When Peggy presented herself at Elaine’s door at the close of school the following day, she was as relieved at the prospect of delivering her news as if it had been a heavy weight which she had been carrying about for nearly twenty-four hours.

Told in Peggy’s glowing language the rather commonplace announcement took on life and color. Even the multiplication table, repeated with such animation, and such assurance of the complete sympathy of one’s listeners, would have seemed touching and impressive. But when Peggy had finished, she was aware of a sudden drop in the temperature. Without meaning to do it she intercepted glances passing between Elaine and her mother, which impressed her as the very reverse of enthusiastic.

"It’s very kind of you, Peggy," Elaine said at length, her manner distinctly apologetic. "Awfully kind to be so interested. But you see--" She hesitated, and again the thermometer seemed to drop several degrees. "But you see doing work like that for pay is very different from doing it for charity."

"O, very different," said Mrs. Marshall in her deepest voice.

"Of course it’s different," admitted Peggy, frankly bewildered. "But it’s nice to earn money for yourself, isn’t it?"

Again the perplexing exchange of glances gave her a feeling of being a hopeless outsider. "O, the money’s all right," Elaine admitted with a hard little laugh. "Nobody could want it much more than I do. But to earn it like a sewing woman--"

"Fortunately," Mrs. Marshall broke in, "there are other avenues. My daughter has hopes of making a comfortable income in a manner less unsuited to her position in life."

"O, indeed." Peggy looked at Elaine, with the respect due to the prospects whose magnificence was suggested by Mrs. Marshall’s manner, rather than her words. To her surprise Elaine was blushing, and looking very uncomfortable. "O, please, mamma," she murmured appealingly.

"Elaine’s literary gift," continued Mrs. Marshall complacently, "has been most pronounced since her childhood. A former governess, Miss Brown--Elaine always called her Brownie--was most enthusiastic over her early attempts. I think, my dear, that she compared some of your first efforts to the writings of--"

"Sometimes I wonder," broke in Elaine with a noticeable increase of color, "if Brownie didn’t say all those flattering things just because she thought we liked to hear them."

"Upon my word, Elaine," exclaimed Mrs. Marshall indignantly. "Such suspicion is very unbecoming, especially in a young girl. And Miss Brown is so sincere, so unaffected, so different from that disagreeable Miss Collier who was always criticizing everything and everybody. Such a relief as it was to get that woman out of the house."

"She didn’t think me much of a genius, that’s certain." Elaine laughed a little, apparently at some recollection whose humor increased with distance. "But I’m not so sure," she added immediately, "that she didn’t mean every word of it."

"Really, Elaine!" Mrs. Marshall’s irritation showed itself by a sudden flushing of her sallow cheeks. "You are in a very singular mood to-day. If you are going to run down poor dear Brownie, and uphold that dreadful Miss Collier, I don’t know but my turn will come next." She drew out her handkerchief rather ostentatiously, and then the awkwardness of the moment was relieved by the arrival of the postman.

Elaine, hurrying to the door, returned with full hands and an expression of countenance anything but enthusiastic. "What a lot of mail!" exclaimed Peggy, thankful for so good an opening for changing the subject.

"Yes, there’s enough of it, such as it is," Elaine responded discontentedly. She slammed the postman’s offering down on the table. "Two bills--no, three, and the others--"

"A young author has much to contend with," said Mrs. Marshall, forgetting her momentary pique in sympathy. "There is a prejudice against the newcomer, but once get a hearing and it is all plain sailing."

Peggy eyed the long envelopes on the table with sudden understanding. They were returned manuscripts. Very business-like they looked with the row of stamps on the right-hand corner, and even sensible Peggy was thrilled for the moment by something vaguely impressive in the thought of writing for publication.

"I’m sure a great many authors had a discouraging experience to begin with," pursued Mrs. Marshall. "Wasn’t it Milton who sold ’Paradise Lost’ for a mere song, and I’m sure ’David Harum’ was refused by any number of publishers." She looked anxiously at Elaine, who, having opened one of the long envelopes after another, was reading over the rejection slips, her forehead creased in an unmistakable frown.

"Let me see," Mrs. Marshall secured a slip, and perused it carefully. "Why, this is rather encouraging. They say that the rejection does not imply any lack of merit."

"But they must say that to everybody," Elaine insisted gloomily. "It’s printed."

"Really, Elaine, if you are determined to take a pessimistic view, read one of the stories to Peggy," cried Mrs. Marshall, forgetting formality for once, "and see what she thinks." Peggy echoed the suggestion heartily. She was really very curious about the contents of those long envelopes.

"If I did, it would be to find out what you really did think about them," Elaine replied. "Most people would say nice things, anyway, but I believe you’d be honest, Peggy." She looked at her friend rather appealingly. "I don’t want to waste my time on what isn’t going to amount to anything."

Peggy felt a marked decline of enthusiasm. "Of course I’m not any critic," she said uncomfortably. "I can tell you what I think, but that won’t be worth much."

"It’s what I want, anyway." Elaine jerked a bulky manuscript from its sheath and settled herself in a rocking-chair. "The name of this," she announced in a defiant voice, "is the ’Maid of the Haunted Well.’ It’s a story for children, you see."

"O, yes." Peggy leaned forward in an attitude of close attention, while Elaine began to read with a rapidity which gave small heed to the marks of punctuation.

"Long ago, on the edge of a vast and mighty forest, lived a young girl, known far and near as the Maid of the Haunted Well. Fair she was, with lustrous, golden hair, that fell in a profusion of silky ringlets. Deep blue were her eyes. Far and wide had the fame of her loveliness spread, and many came to see for themselves if she was as ravishingly beautiful as she was reported to be."

"How wretchedly you are reading, Elaine," remonstrated her mother. "It is impossible to get any idea of the real excellence of the story when you hurry that way." With an evident effort Elaine slackened her speed and continued.

"The Maid of the Haunted Well had hosts of lovers, but to one and all she gave one answer ’Wouldst wed me? Then drink with me one cup of water from the Haunted Well. Whosoever tastes this water shall never--’"

The monotonous voice ceased suddenly, and the sheets comprising the "Maid of the Haunted Well" strewed the carpet like gigantic snow-flakes. "Elaine!" cried Mrs. Marshall.

"I can’t go on with it. It chokes me. Peggy, don’t you think it’s silly?"

Peggy’s struggle between her candor and her sympathy resulted in something of compromise. "I didn’t know just what you were trying to bring out about the haunted well," she replied. "But it sounded rather ingenious, and interesting. At the same time--"

"Well?" It was Mrs. Marshall who insisted on the conclusion of the sentence. Elaine was staring gloomily at the carpet.

"O, I only wondered if nice breezy stories about jolly boys and girls wouldn’t take a little better, but, of course, I don’t know anything about it."

"They are not all children’s stories," said Mrs. Marshall, as Elaine preserved an uncompromising silence. "Read her the ’Daughter’s Defiance,’ Elaine."

For a moment Peggy feared Elaine was going to refuse. She looked ruefully at the dejected figure in the rocking-chair, wondering if her frankness was likely to cost her the friendship she had worked so hard to win. But, after a moment, Elaine reached automatically for another envelope, and drew out a second manuscript. "The Daughter’s Defiance," she read, "Or, True in Spite of All." Peggy tightened her grip on the arms of her chair, and prepared herself for the worst.

"’Leave me, if you have any mercy, I pray you leave me to myself.’ The Countess Rosalie stood trembling, her hands flashing with jewels, clasped in appeal. Beautiful as she always was, she seemed more beautiful than ever, now that grief had left her cheeks white as alabaster."

There was a ring at the doorbell. Peggy hurried to collect the scattered sheets of the "Maid of the Haunted Well," while "The Daughter’s Defiance" found a temporary hiding-place behind one of the couch cushions. Before the scramble was over the bell had rung for the second time, and Elaine, looking self-conscious almost to the point of guilt, went to answer it. Peggy heard a surprised exclamation, then a small voice piping resolutely.

"Want my aunt Peggy."

Even Mrs. Marshall joined in the laughter. "O, Dorothy," cried Peggy as her niece appeared, wearing an expression of triumph. "To think of all that excitement just for you." She put her arms about the little figure fondly. "What do you want, honey?"

"Want to stay with you."

"If you stay, you must be as still as a little mouse. I’m listening to a story."

"I likes stories!" Dorothy climbed upon Peggy’s knee and composed herself to listen. But long before the harrowing adventures of the Countess Rosalie had reached their tragic culmination she had grown restless. Slipping from Peggy’s arms she started on a tour of investigation of the room and its contents, and, to be quite honest, Peggy half wished she might follow her example.

But the Countess Rosalie was finally at peace, and Elaine turned a flushed face on her unwilling critic. "Tell me just what you think of it," she said.

Peggy drew a long breath. The temptation to be comforting and complimentary was for the instant almost irresistibly strong. She fortified herself for the ordeal by recalling the character of Elaine’s appeal. It was not right that the girl should waste her time, if a friendly caution could save her. Nevertheless Peggy heartily wished that the thankless task had fallen to somebody else.

"Of course it’s any amount better than anything I could write, Elaine. I think your imagination is really wonderful. But--"

"Go on." This time it was Elaine who did the prompting. Mrs. Marshall only compressed her lips.

"It seemed to me that there were a good many things in your story that girls can’t be expected to know much about, love and crime and remorse and all that sort of thing. And all the characters are counts and countesses and--Well, I never saw a countess--"

"And you’re wondering if I ever did. Well, no."

"I should think," suggested Peggy, feeling the beads of perspiration start on her forehead, "that it would be better to write about the things you know. That’s all."

"But I don’t know anything worth writing about," said Elaine sharply. Then in a changed voice, "O, I see! Probably that’s just the reason I oughtn’t to try it."

"It seems to me," floundered Peggy, wondering how editors ever lived through the ordeal of rejecting manuscripts, "that after you’ve lived longer--"

"I believe," interjected Mrs. Marshall witheringly, "that Bryant wrote ’Thanatopsis’ at eighteen."

"I believe he did," Peggy acknowledged meekly.

"But this isn’t ’Thanatopsis,’" said Elaine, surveying "The Daughter’s Defiance," with critical eye, "and I’m not Bryant. That’s all Peggy means." She smiled with a courage that did not conceal a quiver of pain, and Peggy looked at her with a contrition no less keen because she herself felt the need of sympathy.

Again a welcome diversion came from Dorothy. In her search for entertainment she had discovered a basket of photographs, placed upon a small stand. Engrossed in the possibilities of her discovery Dorothy had leaned against the basket’s frail support, with the result that the stand was overturned and the pictures strewn far and wide. For the second time during her call Peggy went down on hands and knees to gather up the scattered photographs, having satisfied herself by the agility with which Dorothy scrambled to her feet that she was uninjured.

"O, Elaine!" It was a relief to start a topic of conversation which bore no relation to literary pursuits. "Here’s a picture of you, I never saw before."

Elaine glanced up quickly. "O," she exclaimed, "I didn’t know that was downstairs."

Peggy’s discovery was a kodak picture, apparently a group of picnickers, gathered on the edge of a small lake. When she had removed all traces of the disorder caused by Dorothy’s mishap she carried the picture to the window, for a closer look.

"How heavy your hair used to be, Elaine. You’ve got plenty now, but it was lots heavier then."

No reply.

"I love kodak pictures," Peggy went on. "This is an awfully cute one, but really you look older in it than you look now. I suppose it is because there’s no retouching."

Something in the other’s silence caused her to look up. Elaine’s face was crimson, and her manner so indicative of perturbation that Peggy was on the point of demanding the reason.

Elaine saved her from that blunder. "It’s not a bit good picture," she said hastily. "I can’t bear it. I never mean to leave it where people can see it." She took the offending photograph from Peggy’s hand, and had locked it into the drawer of the desk before Peggy had recovered from her amazement.

On the whole, the afternoon had not been very successful. Peggy suggested to Dorothy that it was time to go home, and Dorothy pranced with uncomplimentary readiness to take her departure. Elaine followed them out into the hall, half closing the door behind them.

"Peggy," she said with an unmistakable effort, "if it isn’t too much trouble, I wish you’d tell Mrs. Ely that I’ll do those cuffs for her."

Peggy turned with a joyful exclamation, and caught Elaine in her arms. "You dear thing. I think that’s just splendid of you." Then, without giving her courage time to cool, she rushed on, "And, O, Elaine, you don’t know how I hated to say what I did. You’ll forgive me, won’t you?"

"I shouldn’t have forgiven you, if you’d said what you didn’t believe," Elaine returned, her lips trembling. "I didn’t want sugar-plums, Peggy. I wanted the truth. I’ve got to do something to earn money, and if I haven’t any chance one way, I’ve got to try another. And, besides," she added, voicing a truth which many people apparently lose sight of, "it’s a lot easier always to say something pleasant than to say what’s true."

Peggy went home in a glow. She was proud of the stand Elaine had taken, and grateful to her for realizing that friendly sincerity may be a costly gift. "And she’s such a sensitive girl, too," Peggy thought. "She was really annoyed because I didn’t quite like the kodak picture of her."

The recollection of Elaine’s face came before her as the thought took shape, and she seemed to see in its expression something more than annoyance. Why should Elaine have cared? Unconsciously Peggy laid the matter of the photograph away in some secret drawer of her memory, along with several other little perplexities, to await a future solution.

*CHAPTER X*

*RUTH IS PERPLEXED*

Peggy was in her room, combing her hair, when Ruth came in. At the sound of her voice in the hall, Peggy pushed the door ajar, and hailed her cheerily.

"Hello, there! Come on upstairs. I’m trying to do my hair Anna’s way, and I’m having such a time."

She had turned back to the mirror, and was struggling with the rebellious locks when Ruth burst into the room, somewhat out of breath after her hasty ascent of the stairs. "O, Peggy!" she panted. "The awfullest thing!"

"What’s happened?" Peggy demanded briskly. She knew Ruth well enough to be aware that the "awfullest thing" might mean that her father was bankrupt or that she had mislaid her thimble. People who habitually indulge in superlatives must not complain over belated sympathy.

"Just read this." Ruth checked herself suddenly. "It’s something," she said in an altered voice "that it would be better for small persons not to overhear."

Peggy turned hastily. Dorothy stood in the doorway, her resentful gaze fastened upon Ruth. Dorothy was extremely sensitive regarding any reference to her tender years, and seldom failed to grasp the import of a carefully veiled allusion to her presence, even though the words used were beyond her understanding.

"There aren’t any small persons over here," she announced, scowling darkly in Ruth’s direction. "There’s nobody here but free big girls."

Peggy discreetly dropped her hair over her face to veil a smile.

"I wonder what Taffy’s doing," she said diplomatically. "I hope he isn’t out on the front lawn where he’ll get into a quarrel with the butcher’s dog."

Dorothy looked stubbornly at the toes of her small shoes, and Peggy tried another tack.

"Let’s see! I wonder if I left any caramels on the plate in the pantry last night. Yes, I believe there were two or three."

"Maybe Dick ate ’em," suggested Dorothy, falling into the snare.

"He hadn’t eaten them fifteen minutes ago when I came upstairs. On the plate with the blue castle, Dorothy, dear, and Sally’ll hand it down to you if you can’t reach it." Peggy laughed out, as Dorothy clattered down the stairs. "Isn’t she quick?" she exclaimed admiringly. "That child knew in a second you wanted to get rid of her." She shook her hair back as she spoke, and, for the first time, caught sight of Ruth’s face.

"Why, Ruth!" Peggy took an impulsive step forward. "Then it’s really--"

"It’s something really dreadful," Ruth returned, biting the lip which would tremble, in spite of her efforts. She turned the key in the lock to secure the conference against further interruptions, and held a letter toward Peggy. "Read that," she said.

The sheet Peggy drew from the square envelope bore a showy monogram at the top. "My dear boy," Peggy read, and then looked up bewildered. "Why, I don’t see--"

"O, go on," Ruth cried, with, an impatient stamp of her foot. "_Do_ go on." And Peggy obediently read the communication aloud.

"MY DEAR BOY:--The charming little pendant came last evening, and I thank you a thousand times. The design is as unique and charming as that of the brooch you sent last week. I noticed that you purchased both at King and Kennedy’s, who are noted, I understand, for exclusive designs, as well as for the superior quality of their goods.

"By the way, I noticed a darling little ring, a combination of pearls and sapphires, in their window the other day. Ask to see it sometime when you are passing. They are most obliging and always ready to show their stock whether you wish to purchase or not.

"Again, with many thanks
"Yours,
"Maud."

Peggy’s blank stare met her friend’s disturbed gaze. "I don’t understand it," she cried. "Who wrote it, and whom is it written to, and why did you bring it to me, and what makes you act as if it was so dreadful?"

"Because it _is_ dreadful." Ruth’s voice was unnaturally hard. "I don’t know who wrote it, except that her name is Maud, but the letter is written to Graham."

Peggy glanced quickly at the envelope in her hand, and then let it fall to the floor, as if it had scorched her fingers. "O, Ruth," she exclaimed reproachfully, "why did you tell me to read it?"

"Peggy, hush! This isn’t a time for quibbling. You’ve got to help me and tell me what to do." The tears of utter misery began suddenly to course down Ruth’s cheeks, and Peggy hastily assumed the role of comforter.

"O, Ruth! You mustn’t feel that way about it. Of course you and Graham have always been great chums, but you must have known that some day there’d be somebody he’d care for more than for you."