The thing inside immediately flew through the air, and rolled away under the toy cupboard. And Peggy followed as far as she could, lying flat on the floor and peering under. Then—“O Nannie, it sparkles!” she cried excitedly. “I do believe it’s a beautiful ring! I can see it quite plainly. Yes, it is. It’s a gold ring with a great big green stone in it! There, I’ve got it! O Nannie, look how it sparkles!”
“A bit of tin and glass,” said Nurse examining it and dropping it on the table. “What they want to put such rubbish in for passes my understanding! You can’t play with it, and it’ll only get left about. Now come and look at the paper blazing,” and she swept all the ends of the crackers into the fire.
Peggy was terrified that her ring would follow too, and she began in a great hurry to put it on all her fingers in turn to see which it would fit.
“It won’t fit any of them except my fum,” she remarked. “But just look how well it fits my fum!” and she waved her left hand to and fro proudly.
“You can’t wear a ring at your age,” said Nurse decidedly, “and no one ever wears them on their thumbs, as you very well know. Oh dear, your hair ribbon’s coming right off, as usual! Come here whilst I tie it on again.”
“Just look how it sparkles!” repeated Peggy, stroking the green stone admiringly. And it certainly did. A bright green light spread from it all over that part of the nursery, just like the light in a beech wood in spring, when the sun is shining through the leaves; and it coloured and played over Nurse’s face and the cupboard and the roses on the wall-paper. “Do look, Nannie,” cried the child, “now the fireplace is green!”
“Very pretty,” said Nurse absentmindedly, not looking up as she brushed Peggy’s curls. “What a tangle your hair’s in, to be sure! Now I think I’ll take off this clean frock and put on your brown holland so that you can have a good game with all your toys out at once, as it’s your birthday.”
“Aren’t you going to play with me, too?” asked Peggy rather wistfully.
“I can’t,” said Nurse. “I’ve some letters to write, and post goes in half an hour—when it’ll be your bedtime. Grown-ups can’t spend all their time playing with little girls, you know. Here, slip your frock off and stay by the fire, whilst I fetch in your other,” and she bustled off into the night-nursery.
“I wish I was grown up,” said Peggy, twirling the ring round and round her thumb and staring into the fire. “Then I should drink strong tea, and eat birthday cake downstairs every day if I liked, and wear grand hats with fevvers in them!”