“Good gracious! you don’t say so!” said the alarmed Mr. Toosypegs. “It’s not anything dangerous, I hope?”
“Well, people generally think the smallpox is dangerous!” began Pet, with a sort of gloomy sternness, when she was interrupted by Mr. Toosypegs, who, seizing his hat, rushed to the door, shrieking out:
“The smallpox! Oh, my gracious! Why, Miss Pet, how could you go to come here, and give it to us all like this? Good gracious! for to think of being all full of holes like a potato-steamer!” said Mr. Toosypegs, wiping the cold perspiration off his face.
“But the smallpox ain’t no circumstance to my trouble,” went on Pet, as if she hadn’t heard him. “I’m going to be sent to school!”
“Come back, Mr. Toosypegs; she hasn’t got the smallpox,” said Ray, laughing. “There is not the slightest danger, I assure you. Pet was only using an illustration that time.”
“Good gracious!” exclaimed Mr. Toosypegs, dropping into a chair and wiping his face with his handkerchief, “if you didn’t pretty near scare the life out of me!”
“Well, you wouldn’t be the first one I’ve scared the life out of!” said Pet, swinging her riding-whip. “I’m apt to astonish people now and then!”
“I should think so,” said Ray. “Do you remember the night she coaxed you out sailing with her, Mr. Toosypegs, and upset the boat; and then added insult to injury by pulling you on shore by the hair of your head? That was an awful trick, Pet.”
“I haven’t got it out of my bones yet,” said Mr. Toosypegs, mournfully. “I never expected such treatment from. Miss Pet, I’m sure, and I don’t know what I had ever done to deserve it.”
“Well, don’t be mad, Orlando. I’ll never do it again,” said Pet, in a deeply-penitent tone. “But, I say, Minnie, when we are going to have breakfast? I’ve an awful appetite this morning.”