He looked across at Georgina, appealingly, helplessly. Peggy’s grief was so uncontrollable he was growing alarmed. Georgina wanted to cry out:
“Oh, I _do_ mind! How can you say that? I can’t stand it to have my beautiful, beautiful prism ruined!”
She was only a little girl herself, with no comforting shoulder to run to. But something came to her help just then. She remembered the old silver porringer with its tall, slim-looped letters. She remembered there were some things she could not do. She _had_ to be brave now, because her name had been written around that shining rim through so many brave generations. She could not deepen the hurt of this poor little thing already nearly frantic over what she had done. Tippy’s early lessons carried her gallantly through now. She ran across the room to where Peggy sat on her father’s knee, and put an arm around her.
“Listen, Peggy,” she said brightly. “There’s a piece of prism for each of us now. Isn’t that nice? You take one and I’ll keep the other, and that will make you a member of our club. We call it the Rainbow Club, and we’re running a race seeing who can make the most bright spots in the world, by making people happy. There’s just four members in it so far; Richard and me and the president of the bank and Mr. Locke, the artist, who made the pictures in your blue and gold fairy-tale book. And you can be the fifth. But you’ll have to begin this minute by stopping your crying, or you can’t belong. What did I tell you about fretting?”
And Peggy stopped. Not instantly, she couldn’t do that after such a hard spell. The big sobs kept jerking her for a few minutes no matter how hard she tried to stiffle them; but she sat up and let her father wipe her face on his big handkerchief, and she smiled her bravest, to show that she was worthy of membership in the new club.
The Captain suddenly drew Georgina to his other knee and kissed her.
“You blessed little rainbow maker!” he exclaimed. “I’d like to join your club myself. What a happy world this would be if everybody belonged to it.”
Peggy clasped her hands together beseechingly.
“Oh, _please_ let him belong, Georgina. I’ll lend him my piece of prism half the time.”
“Of course he can,” consented Georgina. “But he can belong without having a prism. Grown people don’t need anything to help them remember about making good times in the world.”