"Oh, uncle! I am really too much out of breath to play any more. And besides, it is near tea-time, and the children must go and get ready. I will come in a moment, Susan dear, and do your hair. Are there any letters, Uncle John? Oh, two, from the girls; how perfectly delightful! Oh, I must run up, but we'll read them after tea, shall we, Uncle John?"
"With all my heart, my dear; and I have a letter, too, about which I shall want to consult you. Go now, or Susan D. will be trying to braid her own hair, a thing to be avoided, I have observed."
Tea over, and Mr. Montfort seated at ease with his cigar, the children engaged in an enchanting game of Bat (played with worn-out umbrellas, from which the sticks had been taken: this game is to be highly recommended where there is space for flapping and swooping), Margaret opened her letters; reopened them, rather, for it must be confessed that she had peeped into both while she was braiding her own hair and changing her dress for the pretty evening gown her uncle always liked to see.
"Peggy is actually off for school, Uncle John. It does not seem possible that we are in September, and the summer really gone. She seems in high spirits over it, dear child. Listen!
"Darling Dearest Margaret:
"I am going to-morrow; I waited till the last minute, so that I could tell you the last of me. My trunk is almost all packed, and I really think I have done it pretty well. Thank you, ever and ever and ever so much, for the nice things to tie up my shoes in. They are just lovely, and so is the shoe-bag to hang against the wall. I mean to put away every shoe just the very minute I take it off, and not have them kicking about the closet floor at all, ever. And the combing-sack! Oh, Margaret, it is a perfect beauty! Ever so much too pretty to do my hair in, and mother says so, too, but I shall, because you made it for me to, and think of you all the time I am, and—
"I got a little mixed there, but you will know what I mean, dearest Margaret. Tell Uncle John I am so perfectly delighted with the lovely ring, I don't know what to do. Oh, Margaret, you know how I always wanted a ring, and how I used to admire that sapphire of Rita's; and to think of having a sapphire ring myself—why, I can hardly believe it even now! I couldn't go to sleep for ever so long last night, just watching it in the moonlight. Of course I shall write to Uncle John and thank him myself, but I couldn't wait just to let him know how happy I was. (Margaret, if you think he would like it, or at least wouldn't mind it, you might give him a hug just now and say I sent it, but don't unless you are perfectly sure he wouldn't mind, because you know how I love Uncle John, even if I am just the least bit afraid of him, and I'm sure that is natural when you think what a goose I am.)"
Margaret paused, laughing, to throw her arms around her uncle, and tell him that this was "Peggy's hug;" then she went on:
"I was so glad to get your last letter, and to hear all about dear, darling Fernley, and Uncle John, and Elizabeth and Frances, and all the funny things those funny children have been doing. Margaret, they are almost exactly like us children when we were their age. I never began to think about growing up till I read about how they carry on, and then saw that we didn't act so any more, Jean, and Flora, and I. Jean is younger than me, of course, but she's more grown up, I really think. I think you must have a lovely time, now that—well, you said I mustn't call names, and so I won't, but I know just exactly what kind of a person she was, Margaret, and so do you, and you can't deny it, so now!
"Margaret, of course I do feel rather scared about school, for I am still very ignorant, and I suppose all the girls will know about forty thousand times as much as I do, and they will call me stupid, and I know I am; but I mean to be brave, and remember all the things you have said, and mother has helped me, too, oh, a lot, and she says she just wishes she had had the chance when she was a girl, and I know now just how she feels. And then when I come home, you see, I can teach the little girls, and that will be great. But I never shall try to teach them spelling, or history, for you know I cannot; and I cannot remember to this day who Thomas à Bucket was, and why they called him that.