[ABOUT PEGGY SAVILLE.]
By JESSIE MANSERGH (Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey), Author of "A Girl in Springtime," "Sisters Three," etc.
CHAPTER VI.
A week after this, Mrs. Saville came to pay her farewell visit before sailing for India. Mother and daughter went out for a long walk in the morning, and retired to the drawing-room together for the afternoon. There was much that they wanted to say to each other, yet for the most part they were silent, Peggy sitting with her head on her mother's shoulder, and Mrs. Saville's arms clasped tightly round her. Every now and then she stroked the smooth brown head, and sometimes Peggy raised her lips and kissed the cheek which leant against her own, but the sentences came at long intervals.
"If I were ill, mother—a long illness, would you come?"
"On wings, darling! As fast as boat and train could bring me."
"And if you were ill?"
"I should send for you if it were within the bounds of possibility, I promise that! You must write often, Peggy—long, long letters. Tell me all you do, and feel, and think. You will be almost a woman when we meet again. Don't grow up a stranger to me, darling."