CHAPTER IV.

"I don't believe it! I don't believe it!" said Tilly Morris, indignantly, as Dora wound up her recital of the Smithson-Smith story.

"Well, you can believe it or not; but I don't see how you can help believing, when you remember that their name is Smith, and that they are aunt and niece, and that the niece is fourteen or fifteen,—just as the paper said,—and that they are staying at a summer resort not far from Boston, and—that the niece writes to some one in South America,—think of that!"

Tilly thought, and, flushing scarlet as she thought, she burst out,—

"Well, I don't care, I don't care. I'm not going to talk about it, either. How many people have you—has Amy—has Agnes told?"

"I haven't told anybody but you yet. I've just come from Agnes."

"Yet! Now, look here, let me tell you something, Dora. My father, you know, is a lawyer, and I've heard him talk a great deal when we've had company at dinner about queer things that people did and said,—queer things, I mean, that got them into lawsuits. One of the things that I particularly remember was a case where a woman told things that she had heard and things that she had fancied against a neighbor, and the neighbor went to law about it, prosecuted the woman for slander, and they had a horrid time. The woman's daughters had to go into court and be examined as witnesses. Oh, it was horrid; and the worst of it was that even though there was some truth in the stories, there were things that were not true,—exaggerations, you know,—and so the woman was declared guilty, and her husband had to pay a lot of money to keep her out of prison. There was ever so much more that I've forgotten; but I recollect papa's turning to us children at the end, and saying, 'Now, children, remember when you are repeating things that you have heard against people, that the next thing you'll know you may be prosecuted for what you've said, and have to answer for it in the law courts.'"

Dora looked scared. "Well, I'm sure," she began, "I haven't repeated this to anybody but you; and if Agnes—"

"What's that about me?" suddenly interrupted Agnes herself, as she came up behind the two girls. Dora began to explain, and then called upon Tilly to repeat her story of the lawsuit.

"Oh, fiddlesticks!" cried Agnes, angrily, after hearing this story; "you can't frighten me that way, Tilly Morris. We can't be prosecuted for telling facts that are already in the newspapers."

"But we can be for what isn't. It isn't in the newspapers that this Mrs. Smith and her niece are these Smithsons."

"Well, Tilly Morris, I should think it was in the newspapers about as plain as could be. What do you say to this sentence?" And Agnes pulled from her pocket the Smithson article she had cut out, and read aloud: "'An older child—a daughter of fourteen or fifteen—was left behind in this country with Smithson's brother's widow, who has also taken the name of Smith. They are staying at a summer resort not far from Boston;' and what do you say to that letter addressed to some place in South America?"

"I say that—that—all this might mean somebody else, and not—not these—our—my Smiths. What did your mother say when you told her, and showed the paper to her?"

"I didn't tell her; I didn't show her the paper. We never tell mamma such things; she is a nervous invalid, and it would fret her to death," Agnes responded snappishly.

"Well, I don't believe it's my Smiths; I believe it's somebody else," flashed back Tilly, with tears in her eyes and in her voice.

"Oh, very well; you can stand up for your Smiths, if you like; but you'll find they are—"

"Hullo! What's the little Smith girl done now? Agnes, I should think you'd get tired of rattling about the Smiths," interposed a voice here.

It was Will Wentworth's voice; he had come out on the piazza just as the girls were passing the hall door.

Agnes started back nervously at the sight of him. "I think you are very rude to listen and spring at anybody like this," she said.

Will looked at her in astonishment. "I haven't been listening, and I didn't spring at you," he responded indignantly. "I simply met you as I came out, and heard you say something about the Smiths."

"What did you hear?" asked Agnes, quickly.

"I heard you say to Tilly, 'Stand up for your Smiths if you like;' and I knew by that you'd been going for Miss Peggy, and Tilly had been defending her." Will's bright eyes, as he said this, suddenly observed that there was something unusually serious in the girl's face. "What's the matter?" he inquired; "what's up now?"

Agnes put her hand into her pocket, and Tilly drew in her breath with a little gasp, and braced herself to come to the defence again when Agnes should answer this question, as she fully expected her to do, by producing the cutting from the newspaper and repeating her accusations. But when Agnes drew her hand forth, there was no slip of paper in it, and all the answer that she made to Will's question was to say in a mocking tone,—

"Ask Tilly; she knows all the delightful facts now about Miss Peggy and her highly respectable family."

The decisive tone in which this was said, the significant expression of the speaker's face as she glanced at Tilly, and Tilly's own silence at the moment impressed Will very strongly, as Agnes fully intended; and when a minute later she slipped her hand over Dora's arm, and went off with her toward the tennis ground, and Tilly refused to tell him what this something that was "up" was, honest Will felt convinced that the "something" must be very queer indeed.

Poor Tilly saw and understood at once the nature of the impression that Will had received; but what could she do? It was certainly better to keep silence than to speak and tell that dreadful, dreadful story of "Smithson, alias Smith." Even, yes, even if it was true,—for Tilly, spite of her vehement defence, her stout declaration of disbelief at the first, had a shuddering fear at her heart as she thought of that last paragraph about the girl of fourteen or fifteen, and of that letter to South America,—a shuddering fear that the story might be true; but even then she would not be one of those to point a finger at poor innocent Peggy; for, whatever her father might have done, Peggy was innocent.

There was one person, however, that Tilly could speak to, could ask counsel of, and that, of course, was her grandmother. Grandmother, she was quite sure, would agree with her that the story was not to be chattered about; and even if it were true that Mrs. Smith and Peggy were those very Smithsons, neither was to blame, but only, as she had heard her father say once of the family of a man who had proved a defaulter, "innocent victims who were very much to be pitied."

But perhaps—perhaps grandmother would not believe that Mrs. Smith and Peggy were "those Smithsons," and perhaps she would find some careful way to investigate the matter and prove that they were not. With this hope springing up over her fears, Tilly flew along the corridor to her grandmother's room.

"What! what! what!" cried grandmother, as she listened to the story; "I don't believe a word of Agnes's suspicions. There are millions of Smiths in the world."

"But did you hear what I said about that last paragraph,—the girl of fourteen or fifteen, and—and the letter,—the letter to South America?" asked Tilly, tremulously.

"In what paper was it that Agnes found the statement?"

"It was some morning paper: I don't know which one,—I only remember seeing the date."

Grandmother rang the bell, and sent for all the morning papers. When they were brought her, she put on her spectacles and began the search for "Smithson, alias Smith." One, two, three papers she searched through; and at last there it was,—"Smithson, alias Smith!"

Tilly watched her grandmother as she read with breathless anxiety, and her heart sank as she noticed how serious was the expression on the reader's face as she came to the last paragraph.

"Oh, grandmother," she cried, "you do believe it may be our Smiths."

"Well, yes, my dear, I believe that it may possibly be, that's all; but it may not be, just as possibly."

"Oh, grandmother, couldn't you inquire—carefully, you know."

"No, no, my dear. If it isn't our Smiths, think what an outrage any inquiries would be; and if it is, how cruel to stir the matter up! No, we must say nothing. The girl is an innocent creature; and if this Smithson is her father, I doubt if she has been told by anybody the facts of the case,—probably there was some very different reason given her for dropping that last syllable of the name. However it may be, it would be cruel for us to show by our manner or speech any knowledge of the story; for either way, whether they are those Smithsons or not, Agnes has made a very unpleasant situation for them, and we must be good to them."

"But, grandmother, when Agnes tells other people—"

"She won't. Your little warning, by your description of the way she took it, convinces me that she won't."

"But other people read the papers, and they—"

"May not take any more notice than I did, if Agnes's spiteful suspicions are held in check."

"But if poor Peggy herself—"

"Peggy probably doesn't read the newspapers any more than you do. But we needn't waste time in thinking what if this or that; the clear duty for us is to take no notice, and, as I said, be good to them."

"Oh, grandmother, you are such a dear! I knew you'd feel like this."

There was to be an early little dance that night for the young people, and Tilly put on her prettiest gown,—a white mull with rose-colored ribbons,—and went down to dinner in it, for the dance was an informal affair that was to follow very soon after dinner on account of the youth of most of the dancers. Her heart beat more quickly as she looked across at the corner table and saw Peggy and her aunt in their places, and that Peggy was also dressed for the occasion in something white, embroidered with rosebuds, and with ribbon loops of pale blue and a broad sash of the same color.

"Of course, she expects to dance," thought Tilly, "and Agnes will be horrid to her about it in some way or other; but I shall stand by Peggy anyway, whatever anybody else may do."

It was with this kind intention that Tilly hurried through her dinner and hastened out to join Peggy and her aunt when they left the dining-room. But the kind intention was arrested for the moment by Dora's voice calling out,—

"Tilly, Tilly, wait a minute."

The next thing Dora had her hand over Tilly's arm. Amy and Agnes were just behind, and there was nothing to do but to follow the general movement with them to the piazza. That it was a planned movement to separate her from Peggy, Tilly did not doubt; for once out on the piazza, Agnes, with a whispered word to Amy, turned sharply about in the opposite direction to that where Mrs. Smith and her niece were sitting.

A color like a red rose sprang to Tilly's cheeks as she glanced across at Peggy, and bowed to her with a swift little smile. Then, "How pretty Peggy Smith looks!" and "What a lovely gown she has on!" she said, turning a brave and half-defiant glance upon Agnes.

"Yes, it is pretty. It's made of that South American embroidered muslin,—convent work, you know," answered Agnes, casting a fleeting look at Tilly.

"No, I didn't know," answered Tilly, trying to seem calm and indifferent, but failing miserably.

"Yes," went on Agnes, "I know, because my cousins have had several of those dresses, and I'm quite familiar with them."

Peggy, sitting there in her odd pretty dress, saw with pity the distress in her friend Tilly's face.

"Those girls are worrying poor Tilly, auntie, see,—and I dare say it's on my account, for I was sure when she came out that she was intending to join us, and that they prevented her,—and, auntie, I'm going to brave the lions in their dens, and going over to her."

"They are ill-bred girls, and they may do or say something rude," replied auntie, regarding Peggy with a slightly anxious expression.

"Oh, I don't care for that now. Tilly is such a darling in sticking to me, in spite of their disapproval," laughing a little, "that I think I ought to stick to her;" and, nodding to her auntie, Peggy started on her friendly errand.

"What impudence! She's actually coming over to us uninvited. Well, I must say she has nerve!" muttered Agnes, as she observed Peggy's movements.

Coming forward, Peggy nodded to the whole group of girls; but it was to Tilly she addressed herself, and by Tilly's side she seated herself. It was in doing this that the delicate material of her dress caught in a protruding nail in the splint piazza chair with an ominous sound.

"Oh, your pretty gown! it's torn!" cried Tilly.

The two sprang up to examine it, and found an ugly little rent that had nearly pulled out one of the wrought rosebuds.

"It's too bad,—too bad!" sympathized Tilly.

"But it's easily mended, and it won't show," answered Peggy, cheerfully.

"It isn't easy to mend that South American stuff so that it won't show," remarked Agnes, coolly.

"I know it isn't usually," answered Peggy, as coolly; "but auntie can mend almost anything."

"It is a perfectly beautiful dress. I wish I had one just like it," broke forth Tilly, hurriedly, hardly knowing what she was saying in the desire to say something kind.

"You could easily send for one like it," spoke up Agnes, "if you knew anybody out there, or what shop or convent address to send to."

"We could send for you," said Peggy, turning to Tilly. Tilly looked startled.

"Have you friends out there?" asked Agnes, with an impertinent stare at Peggy.

"Yes," answered Peggy, curtly, meeting Agnes's stare with a look of sudden haughtiness.

Tilly turned hot and cold, but through all her perturbation was one feeling of satisfaction. Peggy could stand her ground, it seemed, and resent impertinence; but, "Oh, dear!" said this poor Tilly to herself, "that South American gown, I suppose, proves that she must be that Smithson man's daughter; but grandmother was right,—she is innocent of the facts of the case, of that there can be no doubt,—and we must be good to her, and now is the time to begin,—this very minute, when Agnes is planning what hateful thing she can do next."

Fired by this thought, Tilly sprang to her feet, and, casting a glance of scorn and contempt at Agnes, slipped her hand over Peggy's arm and said,—

"Come, Peggy, let's go over to the other end of the piazza and walk up and down; it's much pleasanter there."

Warm-hearted Tilly's intentions were excellent; but her look of contempt, her meaning words, instead of cowing and controlling Agnes, only roused her to deeper anger, which resulted in an action that probably had not been premeditated even by her jealous and bitter spirit. Tilly will never forget that action. It was just as she was turning away with Peggy, when she saw that angry face barring her way, when she heard those ominous words, "Miss Smithson," and then—and then that outstretched hand thrusting forth to Peggy that fluttering, dreadful slip of paper! 5A8CXgFYNnpFMotsxamFHD8P2XkvL6Fn8OVx6r9qXJabEyNOFxKjC9Un256EzWT0