"Frightened?"
"Yes. I am afraid of that girl, Margaret."
"What girl? You cannot possibly mean Grace?"
Mrs. Peyton glanced around her. Evidently she did mean Grace.
"She behaves so!" she said, in a low voice. "I don't think she is in her right mind, to begin with; it is terrible to be with a person who may break out into madness at any moment."
"My dear," said Margaret, "you are absolutely and wholly mistaken. Grace is as sane as I am. She is one of the sanest persons I have ever known, it seems to me. Of course she is singular—eccentric, if you like. But what has she been doing, to disturb you so?"
Mrs. Peyton glanced around her again, with an apprehensive glance. "Well!" she said, "I—I suppose I may as well tell you, Margaret. I have been ill so long, I may have become—a little unreasonable. There is nobody who cares; I never saw any reason why I should be reasonable. Having to lie here, it is a pity if I may not have my own way, don't you think so? I have had it, at any rate; I don't say that it has always been a sensible way; I detest sensible things and people. I can't imagine how I have endured you so long. I should not, if you were not pretty and prim."
"Thank you!" said Margaret, soberly.
"Don't interrupt me! This has been on my mind for two weeks, and I want to get rid of it. There is nobody else I can tell. Doctor Flower, like a veritable fiend, after sending me this firebrand, goes off to Europe. A physician should be indicted for going to Europe. Well—I don't know what to tell you, or where to begin. She—she frightens me, I say. I never know what she is going to do next. Yesterday—I felt wretchedly yesterday, Margaret; I was in acute pain all day. I suppose I was pretty impatient. I—well, I threw something out of the window in a pet,—my amethyst rope it was,—and she stood and looked at me quietly, as if she were taking notes of my appearance. I couldn't bear it; I told her to go after it. Just a little impatient cry, it was. My dear, in an instant she was out of the window. Gone, out of sight like a flash. I shrieked; no one heard me. I—you will not believe this, Margaret—I got out of bed, and dragged myself to the window, expecting to see her dead and shattered at the bottom. There she stood, cool as crystal, shaking the leaves from her dress. She looked up and saw me, and if ever I saw an elfish look—do you believe in witchcraft, Margaret? my nurse did; she told me some strange tales when I was a child."
"No need of witchcraft in this case," said Margaret, smiling. "Grace is as active as a cat, and her special delight is to climb up and down walls. There is a grape-vine under this window, isn't there? That would be quite enough for the Goat, as they called her at school."