Peggy from Kerry

by L. T. Meade

Facing this was the school itself, where were the classrooms, the great refectory, and the chapel where prayers were read morning and evening. To the right were the rooms occupied by the girls of the Upper School. Here each girl had her own special bedroom. Here was the suite of rooms appropriate to the head-mistress, and here also slept the English teacher, Miss Green, the French governess, and the German governess. Here was a lovely library of most choice books for the use and pleasure of the girls, and here also was the private sitting-room sacred to the girls themselves, and into which not even the head-mistress had a right to enter without the special invitation of the girls. This room was most carefully laid out in ten compartments, each girl owning one, and keeping therein her own precious gifts and possessions. The room had easy-chairs, a thick Axminster carpet, and in winter and spring a bright fire burning in the grate. On the walls hung lovely pictures, many of them the work of former pupils.

The left wing of The Red Gables was devoted to the Lower School. Here also slept Miss Archdale, the clever and delightful second English teacher. Here was to be found Miss Smith, the beloved of all sick or sorrowful children, and here also, on the upper floor, slept the servants of the establishment. The children here—with the exception of little Elisabeth Douglas, who had her own small room on the second floor—slept in two long and very cheerful dormitories. One dormitory was on the first and the other on the second floor. At the end of each dormitory was a small room occupied by a teacher. There was also a large sitting-room downstairs for the use of the girls in wet or cold weather, but this room was unlike the luxurious sitting-room of the Upper School. It was plainly and almost severely furnished, and had a high nursery-fender to keep the young and giddy children from going too near the flames. This room was not private like the Upper sitting-room, but was liable at all times or at any moment to be invaded by Miss Archdale or Miss Smith.

The fact was this: Mrs. Fleming, having a reason in all she did or said, made it a great object that her pupils should realise that promotion to the Upper School was worth waiting for and worth striving for, so that those girls who were really worthy, quite irrespective of age, might go there. This being the case, there were now and then times in the history of The Red Gables when up to twelve girls would be members of the Upper School, while only eight remained in the Lower. Of late years, it is true, this was not the case; and the good lady wondered, without in the least knowing the cause—namely, the baneful influence of The Imp.

The Imp was a great correspondent, and had learned from her friends and satellites, the Dodds, that a most peculiar Irish girl—a sort of raw material—was coming to the school.

The Dodds lived in a huge, vulgar-looking place called Hillside, in the same parish as the Welsh family. Mr. Dodd had made his money in pigs, and had built Hillside some years before this story begins. His one object was to get in with the County, and the object of the said County was to avoid him and his vulgar, red-faced wife and singularly plain daughters. The link between the County and himself seemed to John Dodd to be the clergyman of the place, and in consequence he tried to make great friends with the Welsh family. It was entirely on account of them that he got his daughters admitted into Mrs. Fleming’s school.

The Misses Dodd were quite as commonplace as their name implied, and being completely under the power of The Imp, rejoiced in writing letters to her. Their luxurious home at Hillside was supplied with unlimited carriages, motor-cars, horses, pony traps—in short, all that money could buy. But it is well known that money cannot buy everything; it cannot buy refinement of taste, it cannot buy those inalienable things which come from long descent, from the heart and soul of the born gentleman or lady. These things the young Dodds had not got, and nothing could ever give them those inestimable possessions. Mr. Welsh was, however, the sort of man who could not possibly be rude or unkind to any one; he told his children that they were to be as nice as possible to the Dodds, he allowed them to visit at Hillside, and the news that Mary Welsh had gone to Preston Manor because a little wild Irish girl had arrived there quickly reached the ears of Grace and Anne Dodd. For Grace and Anne to know a thing was, of course, for Kitty Merrydew to know it as soon after as possible. Accordingly, Kitty was prepared for the advent of poor little Peggy in the school.

The first evening passed as usual. The girls assembled in the great hall and stared at each other. Peggy found herself standing close to Molly, who instinctively put out her hand and linked it in that of her little friend. Peggy felt a warm rush of something like gratitude filling her heart, then her bright eyes, blue as sapphires, shining like stars, fixed themselves on the equally bold black eyes of The Imp. There was an instant challenge between those two pairs of eyes. Peggy held herself very erect. The Imp also drew herself up as high as she could—she was a tiny creature, and really exquisitely made—and looked at Anne Dodd, and Anne Dodd laughed. This laugh was very bad manners, and would not have been permitted had any of the governesses been by.

The evening passed much as usual, and by-and-by the moment came when Peggy had to say good-bye to Molly and go across the courtyard to the left wing, where the Lower School lived. For the first time Molly was startled by the passionate intensity of Peggy’s nature, as she said in a low whisper: “For the Lord’s sake don’t let me go alone over there!”

“But I must, Peggy, and you know you’re no coward; and you also know—you are quite sure, you are certain—that nothing will happen to you, darling.”

“Oh I—I can’t go over there alone. Oh, she lives over there!”