"That's Peggy's chair," she said. "Peggy's me little daughter."
"Oh, that's nice," said Marjorie. "How old is she?"
"Just a young thing," said Mrs. O'Mara. "She'll be in in a minute."
Marjorie leaned back again, her tea consumed, and rested. She was not particularly interested in Peggy, because she was not very used to children. She liked special ones sometimes, but as a rule she did not quite know what to do with them. After a few sentences exchanged, and an embarrassed embrace in which the children stiffened themselves, children and Marjorie were apt to melt apart. She hoped Peggy wouldn't be the kind that climbed on you and kicked you.
A wild clattering of feet aroused her from these half-drowsy meditations.
"Here's Francis, mother! Here's Francis!" called a joyous young voice, and Marjorie turned to see Francis, his eyes sparkling and his whole face lighted up, dashing into the room with an arm around one of the most beautiful girls she had ever seen, a tall, vivid creature who might have been any age from seventeen to twenty, and who brought into the room an atmosphere of excitement and gaiety like a wind.
"And here's Peggy!" said Francis gaily, pausing in his dash only when he reached Marjorie's side. "She's all grown up since I went away, and isn't she the dear of the world?"
"Oh, but so's your wife, Francis!" said Peggy naïvely, slipping her arm
from around his shoulder and dropping on her knees beside Marjorie.
"You don't mind if I kiss you, do you, please? And must I call her
Mrs. Ellison, Francis?"
"Peggy, child, where's your manners?" said her mother from the background reprovingly, but with an obvious note of pride in her voice.
"Where they always were," said Peggy boldly, laughing, and staying where she was.