CHAPTER XIV
Facing the Music
Early the next morning Ralph Marshall walked over to the Sunrise Camp.
Without any comment or explanation Howard Brent had delivered, at the breakfast table an hour before, the message entrusted to him.
Except for a slight headache Ralph had entirely recovered from his injury, but he was fearful that Peggy had suffered more than she had confessed and, added to the fact that she had sent for him, was his own desire to know how she was.
For the time being the unfortunate conversation he had held with Terry Benton had entirely passed out of Ralph’s mind. He did think of it occasionally and he was ashamed of it. If Terry had ever reopened the subject, Ralph intended cutting him short by saying that the discussion had been a mistake, and that he had made a fool of himself. But, as Terry did not speak, Ralph had preferred to let the affair drop, not having sufficient courage to plunge boldly into the revival of what he wished to forget.
This morning he was really only interested in finding out that Peggy was all right, and he was deeply and profoundly grateful to her. It seemed almost impossible that any girl could have shown so much nerve and strength. If, in times past, he had liked girls better who were less athletic, whose muscles were less hard, who were altogether more “feminine” according to his preconceived ideas, Ralph had humor enough to realize that his ideal should have changed since the day before.
Peggy Webster had rested and was busy with her share of the morning Camp Fire work when Ralph came into camp. Her greeting of him was entirely cordial and friendly. There was nothing in her manner which might indicate any difference in her attitude from the evening before. She was interested to know that he had slept soundly and that his head was not troubling him. He had seen the hotel doctor who had advised him to pay no further attention to a slight wound which would quickly heal of itself.
It was also Peggy who proposed that they take a walk together after she had finished her tasks. Half an hour later they started off in apparently perfect accord.
Peggy had insisted, both to her mother and aunt, as well as to Ralph Marshall, that she had almost forgotten any discomfort she may have suffered the previous evening and was certainly not too tired for a walk. Indeed, she believed that, getting away from camp and so much talk of a disaster that had almost happened, would be good for her.
Therefore, Ralph Marshall was naturally unprepared for what inevitably followed.