"Which is which? Nip, oh, you dear! Give a paw! Do they know how to give a paw, Hugh?"

"They know how to fetch," said Hugh. "Here, Tuck! here, boys! What have I got?"

He held up a stick; straightway the dogs went mad, and yelled and danced, sneezed and yapped, like wild creatures. "Fetch!" said Hugh, throwing the stick. Together the puppies flashed off in pursuit; fell upon the stick and each other, and rolled over and over, still in frenzied voice and motion; finally came to an understanding, and, taking each an end in his mouth, came cantering abreast up to Hugh, and, laying the stick at his feet, looked up and asked for more, as plainly as ever did Oliver Twist. Here was a pleasant amus.e.m.e.nt for young people. The grave Hugh and the gay Merryweathers, Peggy and Jean, all became absorbed in picking up sticks and throwing them. There was no end to the puppies' enthusiasm, apparently; they yelled, and rushed, and yelled and rushed again; and when Margaret came out an hour afterward, anxious lest her guests should find time hang heavy on their hands, she found one and all flushed and breathless, hurling sticks and stones, and making almost half as much noise as the dogs themselves. At sight of Margaret, cool and pearly in her white dress, Gerald and Peggy dropped their sticks, and looked abashed; but Hugh called to her merrily: "Margaret, they are making great progress. I think my pupil has got farther than yours, though. Miss Margaret and I are training them for a prize contest," he added, turning to Gerald. "This is an extension of their usual practice, that is all."

"Hurrah!" said Gerald, much relieved. "I was afraid she would think--I didn't know whether she would approve," he concluded, somewhat lamely.

It _was_ amazing. It was rather as if the Venus of Milo had begun to sing light opera, Gerald thought; but after all, how much pleasanter if she should, than to stand there all day and wonder how she was going to eat her breakfast without any arms. With this shocking reflection, Master Gerald betook himself once more to the throwing of sticks, and the sport went on till Margaret called the puppies off, declaring that they would be too tired for their afternoon run.

"She takes care of everything, you see!" said Gerald, aside to his brother. "All without any fuss; that's just like Hilda, too."

"Yes," said Phil. "Appears to be a corker!"

"I wish you wouldn't talk so much slang, Phil!" said Gerald. "What kind of word is that to use in speaking of Miss Montfort?"

Philip looked up in amazement, and saw his brother flushed, and evidently annoyed in earnest.

"Well, may I be split and b.u.t.tered!" said Phil.

"I wish you were!" said Gerald, forcing a laugh. "Come along, and don't be an a.s.s!"

CHAPTER X.

GRACE'S SYSTEM

"Margaret!"

"Yes, Mrs. Peyton."

"Is that door shut? lock it, will you? and--just go and look out of the window, please. No one there? Thank you!"

She sank back on her pillows with a sigh of relief.

"What is it?" asked Margaret, soothingly. "What troubles you, dear Mrs.

Peyton?"

"I am frightened!" said Emily Peyton.

"Frightened?"

"Yes. I am afraid of that girl, Margaret."

"What girl? You cannot possibly mean Grace?"

Mrs. Peyton glanced around her. Evidently she did mean Grace.

"She behaves so!" she said, in a low voice. "I don't think she is in her right mind, to begin with; it is terrible to be with a person who may break out into madness at any moment."

"My dear," said Margaret, "you are absolutely and wholly mistaken. Grace is as sane as I am. She is one of the sanest persons I have ever known, it seems to me. Of course she is singular--eccentric, if you like. But what has she been doing, to disturb you so?"

Mrs. Peyton glanced around her again, with an apprehensive glance.

"Well!" she said, "I--I suppose I may as well tell you, Margaret. I have been ill so long, I may have become--a little unreasonable. There is n.o.body who cares; I never saw any reason why I should be reasonable.

Having to lie here, it is a pity if I may not have my own way, don't you think so? I have had it, at any rate; I don't say that it has always been a sensible way; I detest sensible things and people. I can't imagine how I have endured you so long. I should not, if you were not pretty and prim."

"Thank you!" said Margaret, soberly.

"Don't interrupt me! This has been on my mind for two weeks, and I want to get rid of it. There is n.o.body else I can tell. Doctor Flower, like a veritable fiend, after sending me this firebrand, goes off to Europe.

A physician should be indicted for going to Europe. Well--I don't know what to tell you, or where to begin. She--she frightens me, I say. I never know what she is going to do next. Yesterday--I felt wretchedly yesterday, Margaret; I was in acute pain all day. I suppose I was pretty impatient. I--well, I threw something out of the window in a pet,--my amethyst rope it was,--and she stood and looked at me quietly, as if she were taking notes of my appearance. I couldn't bear it; I told her to go after it. Just a little impatient cry, it was. My dear, in an instant she was out of the window. Gone, out of sight like a flash. I shrieked; no one heard me. I--you will not believe this, Margaret--I got out of bed, and dragged myself to the window, expecting to see her dead and shattered at the bottom. There she stood, cool as crystal, shaking the leaves from her dress. She looked up and saw me, and if ever I saw an elfish look--do you believe in witchcraft, Margaret? my nurse did; she told me some strange tales when I was a child."

"No need of witchcraft in this case," said Margaret, smiling. "Grace is as active as a cat, and her special delight is to climb up and down walls. There is a grape-vine under this window, isn't there? That would be quite enough for the Goat, as they called her at school."

"That isn't all," said Mrs. Peyton. "She's not right, I tell you; not canny, as Nurse used to say. You may laugh, Margaret Montfort. I tell you, lying here year after year, one gets to thinking all kinds of things. I could tell you--who knows the old woman was not right after all?--listen to this. Yesterday, this very yesterday, she was standing there by the mantel-piece, talking as quietly as we are talking now.

Suddenly, without a word, down she falls in a swoon, or trance, or something unearthly. I had let the maids go out; we two were alone in the house. There she lay, and I thought she was dead. I got up again! No one knows what it cost me, Margaret. I have forgotten how to walk; I merely dragged myself across to where she lay. She was breathing; I could not see that she was paler than usual--she never has any color, you know. I called and screamed; I raved and wept, I believe; you cannot fancy how terrible it was, that living, breathing form, lying there, the lips almost smiling, but no sign, no twitching of an eyelid, only the beating of the heart, to tell me that she was not dead. Hush! do you know the story of Christy Moran? My nurse's grandmother used to know her. She was--I don't know what she was--but she used to do this very thing. They would find her sitting in her chair, breathing, but without speech or motion, and afterward they would hear of some devilish act or other, committed at that very hour, in some distant town or village, by a figure wearing her likeness. Don't laugh! don't laugh! I tell you, we don't know everything in this civilization that we talk so much about. I tried to say a prayer, Margaret,--I used to say them regularly,--but--and I had hardly begun before she opened her eyes and smiled at me like a child. 'Did you ever hear of catalepsy?' she says, and she went out of the room without another word, and left me to get back to bed as best I could."

Margaret was silent, not knowing what to say. She had no doubt that Grace was acting upon some theory of her own, and was playing these wild pranks in the hope of rousing her patient to action and exercise.

Certainly, to get Mrs. Peyton out of bed twice in two days was no small feat; still, Margaret's gentle mind shrank from the thought of forcing one so frail, so enfeebled by years of invalidism, into sudden activity which might be injurious, or even fatal to her. She could not betray Grace--what should she say? But there was no need of her saying anything, for Mrs. Peyton went on, hurriedly, hardly glancing at her auditor. Evidently it was a relief to her to free her mind.

"Why don't I send her away, you may ask. Margaret, I ask myself the same question twenty times a day. My dear, she is too fascinating! She interests me so! Have you heard her sing, and tell stories? I have not been so interested for years. She makes me restless, I tell you; she makes me think of things I had forgotten, or that I said good-by to years and years ago. Look! she sits down on the floor here, beside the bed--in the night, often, when I cannot sleep, and she has been rubbing me--that is another reason why I do not let her go, Margaret; her touch is like healing balm; there is magic in it, I tell you. She sits down there, with her long hair falling all about her, in the moonlight, looking like nothing earthly, and she talks--or chants, rather,--there isn't anything like it, so I don't know what to call it--about foreign countries. She has never seen them, or she says she never has. That is a little matter to her; she knows all about them, twenty times as much as I do, though I used to travel till I hated the sight of a railway or a steamer. She tells me things about Sicily, and Norway, and the Hebrides,--old Icelandic legends,--about Burnt Njal, and those people; she makes me want to see the places, actually. There are plenty of places I have not seen. She says Iceland is a flower-garden in summer.

Margaret, don't laugh at what I am going to say!"

"Indeed, I am not laughing, dear Mrs. Peyton."

"She says--this girl says--she thinks I could--get up. Get up and do things, I mean, like other people. Did you ever hear of such nonsense?"

Mrs. Peyton laughed; but she looked eagerly at Margaret, and there was something in her eyes that had never been there before.

Margaret leaned over her, and kissed the beautiful forehead. "I am sure you could!" she said; and at the moment she did feel sure. Something of Grace's spirit seemed to pa.s.s into her, and she felt a hope, a confidence, that had never come into her mind before. Why not? Why should it not be? Mrs. Peyton was still in middle life; she ought to have years of life before her. Why might she not be roused, be taught over again how to live, and to enjoy the good and glorious earth?

Margaret's eyes kindled.

"I am sure you could!" she repeated. "Let us try! Let me help Grace, and let us all try our very best, dear Mrs. Peyton. Just think how wonderful it would be to get well; to go about again, and be alive among live people. Oh, my dear, let us try!"

But the lady's mood changed. In a flash, even as Margaret was gazing at her with eager, loving eyes,--eyes in which stood tears of affection and anxiety,--she changed. The mocking smile crept back to her lips, the light of interest died from her eyes.

"Bah!" she said. "Little goose, what do you know about life and live people? It was to get away from them that I took to my bed, do you hear?

There, go away! I have been talking great nonsense; forget all about it!

Sick folks often talk nonsense. Give me something to play with, and go away! I had a new toy yesterday, an amber ball. It's in the top drawer.

Ah! isn't that a beauty? Give it to me! See, how smooth and cool it is, Margaret! Do you think an amber necklace would be becoming to me? I can wear yellow, you know; blondes of my type rarely can, but it always suited me. Do you remember a story about the Amber G.o.ds? It is one of the few stories I ever cared for. To-morrow I'll order a set of amber jewelry, bracelets and necklace, and--"

She stopped suddenly, seeing the grave compa.s.sion in Margaret's eyes.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "SHE LOOKED UP, AND SAW GRACE SITTING ON A BROAD, LOW BRANCH."]

"Don't speak to me!" she cried, angrily. "You are thinking--I know what you are thinking--that I cannot wear necklaces in bed. You think I am a wretched, helpless, faded old woman. I hate you! Go away!" and Margaret went.