“Are ye thin, Mary?”
“I am, Peggy. I am very proud of you.”
Peggy said nothing, but soon afterwards she took an opportunity to go away to her own room. There she locked the door; then she flung herself on her knees by her bedside, and burst into a stormy fit of weeping. After she had dried her eyes she stood for a minute deliberating; then said to herself, “I may as well do it, for I can’t do otherways. Mercy me, ’t ain’t one dhrop o’ slape I’ll get to-night if I don’t do it.” The next minute she was out of the window, had crawled along the roof, and had come to the poultry-yard. She was bending down and waiting for Pat, as she now invariably called him, to bring a ladder. Pat was accustomed to his name; he liked the Irish missy, and so did his wife. The ladder was forthcoming, and Peggy had a good time with the little “hins” and “pigeens.”
“Is it true, Miss Peggy,” said Ann Johns, “that they’re sending you to school at the end of the holidays?”
“Why, thin, it is,” said Peggy. “If I could run away, I would.”
“Oh, but it’s a beautiful school I’ve heard tell,” remarked Ann, winking as she spoke at her husband to induce him to hold his peace.
“It doesn’t matter to me whether it’s beautiful or not,” said Peggy. “I hate it; I hate all schools! Haven’t I had me larnin’?” she continued. “Didn’t I know up to the third standard, and what more could any young girrul want?”
“For a poor girl, of course, that would be plenty,” said Mrs. Johns, “but then you’re a lady, missy.”
“And I tell ye, Mary, I ain’t, and I niver will be. When I’m a growed-up woman I’ll run away back to the O’Flynns. They can’t niver make a lady o’ me, try as they will!”
The servants clustered round as usual to listen to their favourite. Presently a girl rushed up and began to whisper to Mrs. Johns.