"Does it hurt much?" she asked.

Lizzie smiled in a superior way.

"Bless you," she said again, "_hurt's_ no word for it. It's hall over--but it's time I were used to it--never mind about me, missy. I'm sure it was most obligin' of you to bring the shoe, but won't your mamma and your nurse scold you?"

"My mamma's gone away, and so has my nurse," said Peggy. "I'm all alone."

All the eyes looked up with sympathy.

"Deary me, who'd a thought it?" said Brown Smiley. "But there must be somebody to do for you, miss."

"To what?" asked Peggy. "Of course there's cook, and f.a.n.n.y, and my brothers, and my papa when he comes home."

Brown Smiley looked relieved. She was only a very little girl, not more than three years older than Peggy herself, though she seemed so much more, and she had really thought that the little visitor meant to say she was quite, quite by herself.

"Oh!" she said, "that's not being real alone."

"But it is," persisted Peggy. "It is very alone, I can tell you. I've n.o.body to play with, and nothing to do 'cept to look out of the window at you playing, and at the nother window at----"

"The winder to the front," said Lizzie, eagerly. "It must be splendid at your front, miss. Father told me onst you could see the 'ills--ever so far right away in Brackenshire. Some day if I could but get along a bit better I'd like fine to go round to your front, miss. I've never seed a 'ill."

Lizzie was quite out of breath with excitement. Peggy answered eagerly,

"Oh I do wish you could come to our day nursery window. When it's fine you can see the mountings--that's old, no, big hills, you know. And--on one of them you can see a white cottage; it does so shine in the sun."

"Bless me," said Lizzie, and both the Smileys, for Sarah had come back by now, stood listening with open mouths.

"Father's from Brackenshire," said Light Smiley, whose real name was Sarah. She spoke rather timidly, for she was well kept in her place by her four elder sisters. For a wonder they did not snub her.

"Yes, he be," added Matilda, "and he's told us it's bee-yutiful over there. He lived in a cottage, he did, when he were a little lad."

"Mebbe 'tis father's cottage miss sees shining," ventured Sarah. But this time she was not so lucky.

"Rubbish, Sarah," said Lizzie. "There's more'n one cottage in Brackenshire."

"And there's a mamma and a baby--and a papa who goes to work, in my cottage," said Peggy. "So I don't think it could be----" but here she grew confused, remembering that all about the white cottage was only fancy, and that besides the Smileys' father _might_ have lived there long ago. She got rather red, feeling somehow as if it was not very kind of her not to like the idea of its being his cottage. She had seen him once or twice; he looked big and rough, and his clothes were old--she could not fancy him ever having lived in her dainty white house.

Just then came a loud voice from the upper story, demanding Sarah.

"'Tis Mother Whelan," said Brown Smiley, starting up. "Rebecca said as how I was to run of an errant for her. It's time I were off."

Peggy turned to go.

"I must go home," she said. "P'raps I'll come again some day. If mamma was at home I'd ask her if you mightn't come to look out of the nursery window," she added, turning to Lizzie.

"Bless you," said the poor girl, "I'd never get up the stairs; thank you all the same."

And with a deep sigh of regret at having to leave such pleasant company, Peggy ran across the street home.

CHAPTER VII

A BUN TO THE GOOD

"The little gift from out our store."

THE yard door was still open; so was the house door. Peggy met no one as she ran in.

"f.a.n.n.y's upstairs, p'raps," she said to herself. But no, she saw nothing of f.a.n.n.y either on the way up or in the nursery. She did not feel dull or lonely now, however. She went to the back window and stood there for a minute looking at Crippley and Light Smiley, who were still there with the two babies. How funny it seemed that just a moment or two ago she had been down there actually talking to them! She could scarcely believe they were the very same children whom for so long she had known by sight.

"I am so glad I found the shoe," thought Peggy. "I wish, oh I do wish I could have a tea-party, and 'avite them all to tea. I daresay the father could carry Crippley upstairs--he's a very big man."

The thought of the father carried her thoughts to Brackenshire and the cottage on the hill, and she went into the day-nursery to look if the white spot was still to be seen. Yes, it was very bright and clear in the sunshine. Peggy gazed at it while a smile broke over her grave little face.

"How I do wish I could go there," she thought. "I wonder if the Smileys'

father 'amembers about when he was a little boy, quite well. If he wasn't such a 'nugly man we might ask him to tell us stories about it."

Then she caught sight of the little scarlet shoes patiently standing on the window-sill.

"Dear little shoes," she said. "Peggy was neely forgetting you," and she took them up and kissed them. "Next time I go to see the Smileys," she thought, "I'll take the red shoes with me to show them. They _will_ be pleased."

Then she got out her work and sat down to do it, placing her chair where she could see the hills from, the little shoes in her lap, feeling quite happy and contented. It seemed but a little while till f.a.n.n.y came up to lay the cloth for Peggy's dinner. She had been working extra hard that morning, so as to be ready for the afternoon, and perhaps her head was a little confused. And so when Peggy began telling her her adventures she did not listen attentively, and answered "yes" and "no" without really knowing what she was saying.

"And so when I couldn't find you, f.a.n.n.y, I just runned over with the 'nother shoe myself. And the poor little boy what was playing with the--the _not_ the 'nother one, you know, did so cry, but I think he soon left off. And some day I'm going to ask mamma to let me 'avite them all to tea, for them to see the hills, and----" but here Peggy stopped, "the hills, you know, out of the window."

"Yes, dear; very nice," said f.a.n.n.y. "You've been a good little girl to amuse yourself so quietly all the morning and give no trouble. I do wonder if the washerwoman knows to come for the nursery things, or if I must send," she went on, speaking, though aloud, to herself.

So Peggy felt perfectly happy about all she had done, not indeed that she had had the slightest misgiving.

The afternoon pa.s.sed very pleasantly. It was quite a treat to Peggy to go a walk in a grown-up sort of way with f.a.n.n.y, trotting by her side and talking comfortably, instead of having to take Hal's hand and lugging him along to keep well in front of the perambulator. They went up the Ferndale Road--a good way, farther than Peggy had ever been--so far indeed that she could scarcely understand how it was the hills did not seem much nearer than from the nursery window, but when she asked f.a.n.n.y, f.a.n.n.y said it was often so with hills--"nothing is more undependable." Peggy did not quite understand her, but put it away in her head to think about afterwards.

And when they came home it was nearly tea-time. Peggy felt quite comfortably tired when she had taken off her things and began to help f.a.n.n.y to get tea ready for the boys, and when they arrived, all three very hungry and rather low-spirited at the thought of mamma and nurse being away, it was very nice for them to find the nursery quite as tidy as usual--indeed, perhaps, rather tidier--and Peggy, with a bright face, waiting with great pride to pour out tea for them.

"I think you're a very good housekeeper, Peg," said Terence, who was always the first to say something pleasant.

"Not so bad," agreed Thorold, patronisingly.

Baldwin sat still, looking before him solemnly, and considering his words, as was his way before _he_ said anything.

"I think," he began at last, "I think that when I'm a big man I'll live in a cottage all alone with Peggy, and not no one else."

Peggy turned to him with sparkling eyes.

"A _white_ cottage, Baldwin dear; do say a white cottage," she entreated.