'Good-bye, all right,' we whispered, but she heard us.
So did the parrot.
'Good-bye, boys; good Polly! good, good Polly!' and something else which Peterkin declared meant, 'Wednesday at half-past two.'
I felt pretty nervous, I can tell you, that day and the next. At least I suppose it's what people call feeling very nervous. I seemed half in a dream, and, as if I couldn't settle to anything, all queer and fidgety. A little, just a very little perhaps, like what you feel when you know you are going to the dentist's, especially if you haven't got toothache; for when you have it badly, you don't mind the thought of having a tooth out, even a thumping double one.
Yet I should have felt disappointed if the whole thing had been given up, and, worse than that, horribly frightened if it had ended in Margaret's saying she'd run away by herself without us helping her, as I know—I have said so two or three times already, I'm afraid: it's difficult to keep from repeating if you're not accustomed to writing and feel very anxious to explain things clearly—as I know she really would have done.
And then there was the smaller worry of wondering what sort of weather there was going to be on Wednesday, which did matter a good deal.
I shall never forget how thankful I felt in the morning when it came, and I awoke, and opened my eyes, without any snorting for once, to hear Peterkin's first words—
'It's a very fine day, Gilley—couldn't be better.'
'Thank goodness,' I said.
He was sitting up, as usual; but I don't think he had stared me awake this morning, for he was gazing out in the direction of the window, where up above the short blind a nice show of pale-blue sky was to be seen; a wintry sort of blue, with the early mist over it a little, but still quite cheering and 'lasting' looking.