"You can laugh at me," Mabel said, unexpectedly, "I don't care. I ain't funny."
Peggy sank on the sand and gave way to merriment. Mabel regarded her kindly, and Elizabeth took advantage of the occasion to tie four shoe-strings in double bows, and comb two curly heads with the side comb of which she relieved the helpless Peggy.
"This week has been such an awful strain," Peggy said, wiping her eyes, "that whenever I get a reaction, I'm off. Oh, there come the boys, now."
"Awfully sorry," Tom said, hurrying down the beach. He gave a hand to Peggy, which she shook heartily, and then extended it to Elizabeth, who was a little farther away.
Elizabeth gave a little shriek, and put her own hands behind her back.
"I've got a kind of a sore finger," she said.
"I'll remember and not scrunch it," Tom said, "if I get the chance, that is."
"It's going to be sore all the week, isn't it, Elizabeth?" asked the irrepressible Peggy. "I'm all right, because I'm—oh!—oh!" she shrieked, glancing at Tom's blazing hair.
"What's all this mystery?" Bill said, joining the group.
"Peggy is just slightly indisposed, as usual," Tom said. "She has one of her light attacks of mental derangement."