Peggy Webster was standing alone, smoothing the shaggy coat of one of the pair of mules hitched to their wagon. Her brother had gone into the hotel nearby to find a physician for their new acquaintance.
Peggy was not wearing her Camp Fire dress. She was under the impression that it made her more conspicuous in coming to a fashionable hotel, such as this one. The guests might or might not understand the reason for her unusual costume.
However, being Peggy, characteristically her toilet was of the simplest and most convenient kind. She had on a short, tan-colored corduroy skirt and jacket, a cream silk blouse and a corduroy hat. She also wore riding boots of brown leather, finding them more convenient than ordinary shoes.
Yet, in spite of her simplicity, perhaps because of it, she made a charming figure. She was of medium height and slender, with broad shoulders and narrow hips; although Peggy was sixteen, she still suggested in the carriage of her head and body the vitality and grace of a boy rather than a girl. It was difficult to analyze this quality of the girl’s which, however, people recognized at once. It may have come from a certain independence of spirit—a love of outdoor things—a straightforwardness and an avoidance of the emotions which most girls enjoy. Yet none of these qualities are essentially boyish, since ninety-nine boys out of a hundred may not possess them, but the description is used for want of a better one.
From the three months of living outdoors Peggy’s olive skin was a deeper tone and her color more brilliant. In her Camp Fire costume she sometimes wore her hair loose; but on occasions like this, it was braided and fastened close about her small head. In looking close at Peggy, what one was forced to admire in her most was the clearness and beauty of her dark eyes, which stared straight into yours with a perfect faith that the ideals of every human being were as clear and sincere as her own. Another charm was the unconsciously proud tilt of her short, straight nose and chin.
Glancing up to see if her brother had finished his errand, Peggy saw an immaculate figure coming toward her over the carefully tended grounds of the hotel.
She waved a friendly hand toward him, the young man returning her greeting more languidly.
“Gotten up regardless, aren’t you Ralph?” Peggy remarked good-naturedly, as Ralph Marshall joined her.
She did not dislike him as Bettina Graham did; indeed Peggy rarely disliked any one. And Ralph had been coming to their place in New Hampshire for a portion of his holidays for several years. He was ordinarily sweet-tempered and obliging and his affectations and lack of interest in serious matters only amused Peggy, if she happened to think of them at all, while they made Bettina angry.
“Oh, I am showing the West how the thing ought to be done,” he answered with equal good temper, surveying himself with a not unpleasant vanity. For Ralph was extraordinarily good looking—rather too much so to be desirable in a man, according to some ideas. In spite of the fact that it was morning, Ralph was wearing a tennis costume of such amazing perfection that he suggested a magazine advertisement.