Peggy Part 22

"Where are we going to-day?" asked Rose Barclay. "Don't kill us, Peggy!

I haven't got over being stiff yet, from the last tramp. It was jolly, though."

"It was splendid!" chimed in Ethel Bird. "Why, I had no idea what pretty places there were about here. Shall we go to the woods again?"

"I thought of going up Spy Hill!" said Peggy. "It isn't very high, and there's a lovely view from the top."

"Oh, I never can get as far as that!" cried Viola, aghast. "You said a little walk, Peggy, and that is miles and miles, I know it is. Oh, I think I'll go back."

"Oh, don't!" cried Rose, in a tone of heartfelt interest that won Viola's susceptible heart. "It isn't very far, truly it isn't; and I want to ask you where you got that hat. It is too perfectly lovely for anything! I've got to have a new hat, and I do wish--"

"My dear!" cried Viola, dimpling all over with pleasure, "I'll tell you all about it. You see--"

There was no more trouble with Viola. Peggy chuckled, and started off at a round pace, the others following.

The two Owls, standing at their window with arms intertwined, just thinking of taking a little flutter in the cool of the afternoon, looked after them with friendly eyes.

"What's the matter with Peggy Montfort?" said the Fluffy to the Snowy.

"_She's_ all right!" said the Snowy to the Fluffy. And then they looked at each other sternly, and shook their heads in grave rebuke. "My dear,"

they said both together, "we are surprised!"

CHAPTER XV.

WHAT WAS THE MATTER WITH LOBELIA PARKINS?

"Lobelia, I insist upon knowing!"

"Oh, Peggy, please don't ask me!"

"But I will ask you. I do ask you. What is it that you are afraid of? I shall find out sooner or later, so you might as well give up at once and tell me."

Lobelia looked around her uneasily. She and Peggy were sitting in a cosy little hollow under the lee of a great brown rock, waiting for the others to come up.

"Come!" said Peggy. "There's n.o.body behind that rock. What is the matter with you, Lobelia Parkins, and why don't you sleep? Out with it!"

Lobelia sighed, and twisted her b.u.t.tons. "I--I never am a very good sleeper," she said at last. "I--I'm nervous, Peggy. And then--"

"And then, what?"

"Oh, dear me! I can't tell you. You won't believe me if I tell you.

Things come into my room and frighten me."

"Things? What do you mean, Lobelia?"

"I don't know what I mean!" cried the poor girl, looking about her again, as if in dread of some unseen terror. "I don't know who it is, or what it is. Something--or somebody--comes through my room at night and goes out of the window."

"Ah!" said Peggy. "Well, go on. How long has this been going on?"

"Oh, ever so long! At first--Peggy, you will feel badly if I tell you this."

"Well, then, I've got to feel badly," said Peggy, stoutly. "Though I can't see what I have to do with it--so far. I'll have plenty to do with it from now on!" she added, significantly. "Go on, Lobelia."

"Well, you know that time you were so good to me, Peggy; when Blanche Haight and those others were teasing me, and you came in like a lioness and drove them off. I never shall forget it as long as I live, Peggy, never!"

"Nonsense!" said Peggy. "It wasn't anything at all. Don't be absurd, Lobelia. Well, what since then?"

"It began after that. She--I know that it used to be Blanche Haight then--she used to come in after I was in bed, and frighten me. She had a sheet on, and at first I thought it was a ghost, and I fainted the first time, I think; and then she used--she used to make faces and pinch me, and one time I saw her ring, and so I knew who it was."

"The cowardly brute!" muttered Peggy. "It's well for her that she's out of this school. Now, Lobelia Parkins, why, in the name of all that is feeble-minded and ridiculous, didn't you tell me this before?"

"Oh, I couldn't!" said Lobelia. "I had given you enough trouble, Peggy.

And besides--"

"Well! besides what?"

"I was afraid! I was afraid she would kill me if I told."

"My goodness gracious _me_!" cried Peggy, bouncing on her mossy seat, till Lobelia shrank away scared and trembling. "Do you think we live in the Middle Ages, Lobelia Parkins? This is what comes of reading history; it puts all those old-fangled notions into your head, till you have no sense left. I know! You had all that stuff about Florence and Rome, and poisoning, and all that. I had it too; awful stuff, and probably two-thirds lies. History is the father of lies, you know; somebody says so somewhere."

"I--I thought it was Herodotus who was called that," Lobelia ventured, timidly.

"Perhaps it was; it's all the same."

"No, I am wrong. Herodotus was called the father of history, and then some other people said he was the father of lies; but now it has all come true, so he isn't any more!"

Lobelia, who was stupid and painstaking, proffered this lucid explanation painfully, and then gasped; it seemed a liberty for her to explain anything to anybody.

"Who cares?" said Peggy. "He's dead, anyhow. Oh, how it used to provoke my dearest Margaret when I said that. I only mean, I never see how it can matter so much as people think. But you are not dead, Lobelia; and the idea of your being killed, here in this school, in the nineteenth century! Why, it is absurd, don't you see? It is funny! You must laugh about it, my dear!"

Lobelia, with an effort, produced a watery smile; seeing which, Peggy's mood changed, and she laid her hand instantly on the skinny, shrinking arm.

"My dear, don't think I was laughing at _you_," she cried, warmly. "No; I am going to be furious in a minute, when I get round to that part again. Well, but Lobelia, Blanche Haight is gone now, and a good riddance, and yet you say you are still afraid. What are you afraid of?"

"I--I don't know who it is now!" said Lobelia. "But some one comes through, just the same."

"How do you mean, just the same? some one pinches you?"

"No! oh, no! this person never speaks to me or looks at me.

It--she--only wants to go through the window. It has something light gray over its head and shoulders. It goes down the fire-escape and stays about half an hour, and then comes back. I--I don't mind it so very much, now. I dare say it's all right, only--I can't sleep very well, you know."

"I see!" said Peggy. "Well, I think we can settle that matter, Lobelia.

Hus.h.!.+ here come the others. We won't say anything more about it now.

Well, girls, how did it go? Isn't it a lovely little scramble?"

Rose Barclay and Viola appeared, with the other two just behind. Viola was panting, and her delicate colour was deepened by exertion till she was almost as rosy as her companion.