“It is quite true!” she said. “We have left you alone, Peggy; but it is not quite so bad as you think. Really and truly we like you far the best, but—but Rosalind is such a change to us! Everything about her is so beautiful and so different, that she has always seemed the great excitement of our lives. I don’t know that I’m exactly fond of her, but I want to see her, and talk to her, and hear her speak, and she is only here for a short time in the year. It was because we looked upon you as really one of ourselves that we seemed to neglect you; but it was wrong, all the same. As for your spoiling her dress on purpose, it’s ridiculous to think of it. How could you say such a thing, Mellicent, when Peggy was trying to help you, too? How could you be so mean and horrid?”
“Oh, well, I’m sure I wish I were dead!” wailed Mellicent promptly. “Nothing but fusses and bothers, and just when I thought I was going to be so happy! If I’d had white shoes, this would never have happened. Always the same thing! When you look forward to a treat, everything is as piggy and nasty as it can be! Wish I’d never come! Wish I’d stayed at home, and let the horrid old party go to Jericho! Rosalind’s crying, Peggy’s cross, you are preaching! This is a nice way to enjoy yourself, I must say!”
Nothing is more hopeless than to reason with a placid person who has lapsed into a fit of ill-temper. The two elder girls realised this, and remained perfectly silent while Mellicent continued to wish for death, to lament the general misery of life, and the bad fortune which attended the wearers of black slippers. So incessant was the stream of her repinings, that it seemed as if it might have gone on for ever, had not a servant entered at last, with the information that the guests were beginning to arrive, and that Lady Darcy would be glad to see the young ladies without delay. Esther was anxious to wait and help Peggy with her toilet, but that young lady was still on her dignity, and by no means anxious to descend to a scene of gaiety for which she had little heart. She refused the offer, therefore, in Mariquita fashion, and the sisters walked dejectedly along the brightly-lit corridors, Mellicent still continuing her melancholy wail, and Esther reflecting sadly that all was vanity, and devoutly wishing herself back in the peaceful atmosphere of the vicarage.
Chapter Twenty Two.
Fire!
It was fully half an hour later when Peggy crept along the passage, and took advantage of a quiet moment to slip into the room and seat herself in a sheltered corner. Quick as she was, however, somebody’s eyes were even quicker, for a tall figure stepped before her, and an aggrieved voice cried loudly—
“Well, I hope you are smart enough to satisfy yourself, now that you are ready! You have taken long enough, I must say. What about that first waltz that you promised to have with me?”
Peggy drew in her breath with a gasp of dismay.