“No,” laughed Peggy, “it seems I’m not. Oh, wasn’t that funny? There I was dying all by myself a minute ago of something that I didn’t have at all.”
“I say, what we ought to do, though—there is a tea house somewhere near here where we can get something hot and then you’ll feel a lot better and I don’t mind saying that I will too. Come on, I know the way, and I’ll walk on the windy side of you like this and—why, it’s going fine, we’ll be there in no time.”
With courage and interest and even happiness surging back into her heart now that this big handsome boy was striding along by her side and cheering her with laughing remarks that ignored the wild storm about them, Peggy found snow-shoeing exhilarating once more, and they made good time, and were soon stamping in to the little tea house.
In the neighborhood of Andrews were a number of tea rooms and dainty restaurants, for it was a rich school, and a good share of the girls’ pocket-money went for good things to eat. Peggy was familiar with many of them, but she had never happened to come here before. So she knew that they must be a greater distance from the school than she had supposed. Also, most of the people seated around the adorable little tables were boys instead of girls, and they all looked up with interest at the entrance of the snowy pair.
“Why, hello, Jim,” one of the boys called out to Peggy’s companion. “Playing Santa Claus?”
Jim merely smiled and bowed, and guided Peggy to a table by a roaring open fire. Then he took her sweater and cap and flung them across a chair to dry.
“Where do all these boys come from?” inquired Peggy. “It looks like a perfect wilderness around here.”
“We are near Anderwood, the boys’ prep school,” explained her companion. “I used to go there—just last year, in fact—and I was over visiting some of my friends to-day. Most of the fellows are having exams right now, you know, and there were two hours this afternoon when every fellow I knew was booked for something, so I borrowed a pair of snow-shoes and a dog and—took a stroll.”
“And you strolled right over to a girls’ school,” laughed Peggy.
“As fast as I could go,” the young man answered without embarrassment. “I’ll tell you just what I was going to do, too. I don’t know a soul at Andrews—or didn’t until I almost ran over you in the storm. But I was just going to look at a certain window. Now, I bet you’d hate to tell me what you think of me.”