Given as a background a beautiful, carefully preserved estate, which for generations has been the pride of its owners, a superb old mansion of the most perfect colonial type, a sunny September morning, and as the figures upon that background a charming young girl in a white linen riding-skirt, her rich coloring at its best, her eyes shining, her seat in her saddle so perfect that she seemed a part of her mount, and you have something to look upon. To this add three thoroughbred horses and a snowy dog, an old colored servitor, for Jerome had come out with a message from Harrison, and it is a picture to be appreciated. Had the tall woman standing upon the broad piazza been able to do so, many things which happened later might never have happened at all.
Mrs. Stewart was elaborately gowned in a costume better suited for a drive in Newport than Annapolis, especially Annapolis in September. It was a striking creation of pale blue linen and Irish point lace, with a large lace hat, heavy with nodding plumes and a voluminous white lace veil floating out about it. She was a handsome woman in a certain conspicuous way, and certainly knew how to purchase her apparel, though, not above criticism in her selection of the toilet for the occasion, as the present instance evinced. She now walked to the piazza steps, and had anyone possessing a sense of humor been a witness of it, the transformation which passed over the lady's face en transit would have well nigh convulsed him, for the smile which had illumined her countenance at the door had gradually faded as she advanced until, when the steps were reached, it had been transformed into a most disapproving frown.
To Peggy the reason was a mystery, for she had not overheard her aunt's comments upon the occasion of the drive from the railway station three days before. Of course Jess had, and they had been freely circulated and keenly resented in the servants' quarters, but no whisper of them had been carried to the young mistress. Nevertheless, Peggy was beginning to discover that a good many of her actions, and also the order of things at Severndale, had brought a cloud to her Aunt's brow, and a little sigh escaped her lips as she wondered what the latest development would prove. It seemed so easy for things to go amiss nowadays, when heretofore nearly everything had seemed, as a matter of course, to go right. Then the self-elected dictator spoke:
"Peggy, dear, are you not to drive with me?"
"Thank you, Aunt Katherine, but I always ride, and I have several errands to do which I can better attend to if I am mounted."
"Well, it can hardly be necessary for you to have three saddle horses at once. It seems to me unnecessarily conspicuous, and in very bad taste for a young girl to go tearing about the country, and especially into Annapolis—the capital City of the State—in the guise of a traveling circus."
A slight smile curved Peggy's lips as she answered:
"Annapolis is not New York, Aunt Katherine. What might be out of place in such a city would be regarded as a matter of course in a little town where everybody knows everybody else, and they all know me, and the Severndale horses. Nobody ever gives us a thought. Why should they? I'm nothing but a girl riding into town on an errand."
"You are extremely modest, I must say. Is it quite native or well—we'll dismiss the question, but I must ask you to do me the favor of leaving your bodyguard behind today; it may not seem conspicuous for you to play in a Wild West Show, but I must decline to be an actor. You are growing too old for such mad pranks, and are far too handsome a girl to invite observation."
Peggy turned crimson.