CHAPTER VI.
A DAY IN BED.
It makes one feel very sick to cry for a long time. Peggy cried till she was so tired that she had to stop because it hurt her to go on. Her face was swollen up, and her eyes were red, and she looked quite ugly. But at last she got so tired that she fell sound asleep, and only wakened up to have dinner. It was a horrid dinner—cold mutton, rice pudding without raisins in it, and with no sugar sprinkled over it; that was all. However, Peggy was wonderfully hungry, and she ate it up. Then came a very long hour. She sat up in bed, and looked out at the ships; she made hills and valleys with the sheets, piling them up, and smoothing them out; she counted the roses on the wall-paper; she plaited the fringe of the counterpane into dozens of little plaits, and yet the clock in the hall had only struck three. There was the whole long day to get through!
Then she heard the door-bell ring, and some one was shown into the drawing-room. She wondered who it could be.
After ten minutes or so, she heard the drawing-room door open again, and Aunt Euphemia’s voice in the hall, saying,—
“No; Peggy is in bed to-day!”
“In bed? I hope the little woman isn’t ill!” some one said—Dr. Seaton, Peggy thought, with a throb of delight. Perhaps he would help her.
“No, not ill. I am sorry to say she was a very naughty child. I am keeping her in bed as a punishment.”
Peggy heard the speakers pause near her door. Dr. Seaton had evidently stood still as he was going out.