Peg O' My Heart Part 72

"Mustn't I, now? Well, let me tell ye it did upset me--an' I'm still upset--an' I'm goin' to kape on bein' upset until I get into the cab that dhrives me from yer door."

"Oh, come, now--what nonsense! Of course the mater was a teeny bit disappointed--that's all. Just a teeny bit. But now it's all over."

"Well, _I_ was a WHOLE LOT disappointed--an' it's all over with me, too." She started again to get away from him, but he stepped in front of her.

"Don't go for a minute. Why not forget the whole thing and let's all settle down into nice, cosy, jolly little pals, eh?"

He was really beginning to warm to his work the more she made difficulties. It was for Alaric to overcome them. The family roof was at stake. He had gone chivalrously to the rescue. He was feeling a gleam of real enthusiasm. Peg's reply threw a damper again on his progress.

"Forget it, is it? No--I'll not forget it. My memory is not so convaynient. You're not goin' to be disgraced again through me!" She pa.s.sed him and went on to the landing. He followed her eagerly.

"Just a moment," he cried, stopping her just by an a oriel window. She paused in the centre of the glow that radiated from its panes.

"What is it, now?" she asked impatiently. She wanted to go back to her room and make her final preparations.

Alaric looked at her with what he meant to be adoration in his eyes.

"Do you know, I've grown really awfully fond of you?" His voice quivered and broke. He had reached one of the crises of his life.

Peg looked at him and a smile broadened across her face.

"No, I didn't know it. When did ye find it out?"

"Just now--down in that room--when the thought flashed through me that perhaps you really meant to leave us. It went all through me. 'Pon my honour, it did. The idea positively hurt me. Really HURT me."

"Did it, now?" laughed Peg. "Sure, an' I'm glad of it."

"Glad! GLAD?" he asked in astonishment.

"I am. I didn't think anythin' could hurt ye unless it disturbed yer comfort. An' I don't see how my goin' will do that."

"Oh, but it will," persisted Alaric. "Really, it will."

"Sure, now?" Peg was growing really curious. What was this odd little fellow trying to tell her? He looked so tremendously in earnest about something What in the world was it?

Alaric answered her without daring to look at her.

He fixed his eye on his pointed shoe and said quaveringly:

"You know, meetin' a girl round the house for a whole month, as I've met you, has an awful effect on a fellow. AWFUL Really!"

"AWFUL?" cried Peg.

"Yes, indeed it has. It grows part of one's life, as it were. Not to see you running up and down those stairs: sittin' about all over the place: studyin' all your jolly books and everything--you know the thought bruises me--really it BRUISES."

Peg laughed heartily. Her good humour was coming back to her.

"Sure, ye'll get over it, Alaric," she said encouragingly.

"That's just it," he protested anxiously. "I'm afraid I WON'T get over it. Do you know, I'm quite ACHE-Y NOW. Indeed I am."

"Ache-y?" repeated Peg, growing more and more amused.

Alaric touched his heart tenderly:

"Yes, really. All round HERE!"

"Perhaps it's because I disturbed yer night's rest, Alaric?"

"You've disturbed ALL my rest. If you GO I'll never have ANY rest."

Once again he spurred on his flagging spirits and threw all his ardour into the appeal. "I've really begun to care for you very much. Oh, very, very much. It all came to me in a flash--down in the room."

And--for the moment--he really meant it. He began to see qualities in his little cousin which he had never noticed before. And the fact that she was not apparently a willing victim, added zest to the attack.

Peg looked at him with unfeigned interest:

"Sure, that does ye a great dale of credit. I've been thinkin' all the time I've known ye that ye only cared for YERSELF--like all Englishmen."

"Oh, no," protested Alaric. "Oh, DEAR, no. We care a great deal at times--oh, a GREAT deal--and never say a word about it--not a single word. You know we hate to wear our hearts on our sleeves."

"I don't blame ye. Ye'd wear them out too soon, maybe."

Alaric felt that the moment had now really come.

"Cousin," he said, and his voice dropped to the caressing note of a wooer: "Cousin! Do you know I am going to do something now I've never done before?"

He paused to let the full force of what was to come have its real value.

"What is it, Alaric?" Peg asked, all unconscious of the drama that was taking place in her cousin's heart! "Sure, what is it? Ye're not goin'

to do somethin' USEFUL, are ye?"

He braced himself and went on: "I am going to ask a very charming young lady to marry me. Eh?"

"ARE ye?"

"I am."

"What do ye think o' that, now!"

"And--WHO--DO--YOU--THINK--IT--IS?"

He waited, wondering if she would guess correctly. It would be so helpful if only she could.

But she was so unexpected.

"I couldn't guess it in a hundred years, Alaric. Ralely, I couldn't."

"Oh, TRY! Do. TRY!" he urged. "I couldn't think who'd marry YOU--indade I couldn't. Mebbe the poor girl's BLIND. Is THAT it?"

"Can't you guess? No? Really?"