"I'm so glad!" she said. "How's the poor little thing? Better? I'm sure you did her a great deal of good."
"Oh, no!" stammered Peggy, pleased and confused. "I couldn't really do anything; but she is feeling better."
Gertrude Merryweather nodded wisely. "My dear, you can do a great deal for her!" she said. "We'll have a talk sometime; no chance now. Only, Bertha has been telling me things, and I'm so glad you are in our street! There, now V. shall have you."
Judge of the glow at Peggy's heart, on these words from the Junior President, the best-loved girl—or so it was said—in the whole school. Those foolish tears actually got half-way up to her eyes,—only they were very different from the last tears; but fortunately Viola's high-pitched babble drove them back again.
"My dear! How nice you look! perf'ly fine! doesn't she, V.? Say, that's a dandy pin you've got on, simply dandy! There! isn't this too quaint for anything? You comfy? so'm I! Room, my dear? gallons of room! I haven't seen you for an age; where have you kept yourself? I looked into your room, though, and it's perf'ly fine! I told you it would be, when you had things fixed. Your chintz is too perfectly sweet for anything; isn't it, V.? We were simply cold with envy, weren't we, V.?"
"Do cackle for yourself, if you must cackle, V.!" responded Vivia Varnham, who sat on the same bed, a little lower down. "I can't hear myself think, you make such a noise."
"No, really?" cried Viola. "But that must be such an advantage sometimes, V. But, say! we came here to hear the Snowy talk, didn't we? She hasn't had much chance yet, has she? Are you ready to talk, Snowy? Oh, you duck! it is too perfectly enchanting to have you back again. I haven't lived since you went away, have I, V.? I've been simply a vegetable, haven't I, V.? Potatoes, my dear, are lively compared to me. Are you ready to talk, Snowy?"
"If you are ready to have me," replied the Snowy Owl, laughing. "First, however—here!"
She produced a mammoth box of "marshmallows," and handed it around. It was received with a shout.
"Toast 'em!" cried one. "Hat-pins!" cried another. There was a movement toward the gas-jet; but Bertha Haughton checked it decidedly. "You have come here to hear the Snowy tell!" she said. "It's a long tell, and if you begin toasting now, there won't be time. Tell first, toast afterward! that's what I say!"