The blank expression with which Mrs. Vanderpool regarded her made plain the impossibility of their ever coming to an understanding. Peggy started to go on, and then lapsed into silence, realizing the uselessness of further explanations. Mrs. Vanderpool having relieved her mind by a long stare, turned majestically away, and Peggy heard her a little later, talking animatedly of some one who, it appeared, was totally lacking in the business instinct. Peggy thought she could come very near guessing the identity of the person referred to. But as she went on pointing out to possible purchasers the flaws in her wares, she made up her mind that the chance of being over-particular in matters of right and wrong was very trifling compared with the danger of not being particular enough.
CHAPTER VI
PRISCILLA HAS A SECRET
Peggy was worried about Priscilla. For the first time in their years of intimacy she could not understand her friend; and worst of all, it seemed out of the question to discuss the situation and come to an understanding.
"Do you think she can like him?" Peggy asked the other Friendly Terrace girls despairingly. "Because he's always seemed to me almost a joke. I don't know how I could bear to have Priscilla fall in love with a man I wanted to laugh at."
Though both girls would have been glad to reassure her, an ominous silence followed her outbreak. "There's no accounting for tastes," said Ruth at length, a suggestion of superiority in her tone.
"Priscilla ought to have a good talking to," exclaimed Amy. "She's got plenty of sense, and to think of her letting Horace Hitchcock hang around! I'd like to tell her—"
"You mustn't, Amy," Peggy interrupted. "It would never do to let her know how you feel about it. That's one of the things that make me so anxious—she's so awfully touchy on the subject of Horace. She won't have him criticized."
Peggy had valiantly done her best to cultivate a liking for Horace Hitchcock. Since the fatal Field Day when he had acted as Priscilla's escort, his attentions had been unremitting. He had called several times a week. He had brought Priscilla flowers and boxes of candy, to say nothing of books of poems, from which he had read aloud to her by the hour. Peggy, assuming that since Priscilla was seeing so much of Horace, he must be quite a different person from what she supposed, had invited him to her home along with the others of her little circle, only to find it would not do. Horace and the others would not mix any more than oil and water.