About half-past ten a servant from Le Bateau brought her a note from Ann Eliza, who wrote as follows:
"Dear Jerrie:—
"Have pity on a poor cripple, and come as soon as you can and see me. I sprained my ankle last night in that awful storm, and Tom had to bring me home in his arms. Think of it, and what my feelings must have been. I am hardly over it yet—the queer feelings, I mean—for, of course, my ankle is dreadful, and so swollen, and pains me so that I cannot step, but must stay in my room all day. So come as soon as possible. You have never seen the inside of our house or my rooms. Come to lunch, please. We will have it up here. Good-by.
"From your loving friend,
"Ann Eliza.
"P.S.—I wonder if Tom will call to inquire for me?"
"Tell her I will be there by lunch-time," Jerrie said to the man, while to her grandmother she continued: "The baking and cleaning are all done, and I can finish the ironing when I get back; it will be cooler then, and I do want to see the inside of that show-house which Harold says cost a hundred thousand dollars. Pity somebody besides the Peterkins did not live there."
And so, about twelve o'clock Jerrie walked up to the grand house of gray stone, which, with its turrets, and towers, and immense arch over the carriage drive in front of a side door, looked like some old feudal castle, and flaunted upon its walls the money it had cost. Even the loud bell which echoed through the hall like a town clock told the wealth and show, as did the colored man who answered the summons, and bowing low to Jerrie, held out a silver tray for her card.
"Nonsense, Leo!" Jerrie said, laughingly, for she had known the negro all her life and played with him, too, at times, when they both went to the district school, "I have no card with me. Miss Ann Eliza has invited me to lunch, and I have come. Tell her I am here."
With another profound bow, Leo waved Jerrie into the reception-room, and then started to deliver her message.
Seated upon one of the carved chairs, Jerrie looked about her curiously, with a feeling that the half had not been told her, everything was so much more gorgeous and magnificent than she had supposed. But what impressed and at the same time oppressed her most was the height of the walls from the richly inlaid floor to the gayly decorated ceiling overhead. It made her neck ache staring up fourteen feet and a half to the costly center ornament from which the heavy chandelier depended. All the rooms of the old house had been low, and when Peterkin built the new one, he made ample amends.
"I mean to lick the crowd," he said; and a man was sent to Collingwood, and Grassy Spring, and Brier Hill, and lastly to Tracy Park, to take the height of the lower rooms. Those at Tracy Park were found to be the highest, and measured just twelve feet, so Peterkin's orders were to "run 'em up—run 'em up—run 'em up fourteen feet, for I swan I'll get ahead of 'em."
So they were run up fourteen feet, and by some mistake, half a foot higher, looking when finished so cold and cheerless and bare that the ambitious man ransacked New York and Boston and even sent to London for adornments for his walls. Books were bought by the square yard, pictures by the wholesale, mirrors by the dozen, with bronzes and brackets and sconces and tapestry and banners and screens and clocks and cabinets and statuary, together with the costliest rugs and carpets and the most exquisite inlaid tables to be found in Florence or Venice. For Peterkin sent there for them by a gentleman to whom he said:
"Git the best there is if it costs a fortune. I'm bound to lick the crowd."