Peggy Parsons at Prep School Part 12

"I'll try to walk right in her steps," Peggy decided, "and then I'll get just the right method-but, oh, my goodness, what a tall girl she must be! These footprints are so far apart I can't possibly take such long steps. She must be a wonderful snow-shoeist-maybe she won't want to walk with me even when I do catch up to her, since she's apparently so much more expert."

With ludicrous attempts to fit her steps into those of Friday, she pursued her way until at last she had climbed the hill where the tracks had at first been lost, and there they were continuing, forever, it seemed.

Without hesitation Peggy followed. Lost to all but the exhilaration of a brand new exercise, and the stimulus of the cold wind that yet never chilled her glowing face, she kept on until Andrews was a thing of the past, and she could not have found her way back except for the tracks she was making now. And then all of a sudden she noticed something was different. The footprints no longer gleamed in her eyes, and the beautiful dazzle of the snow was blotted out. In an instant more a whirling ma.s.s of moist snow flakes was falling about her, obscuring everything but their own fantastic, falling selves.

"Well," decided she promptly, "I guess I'll be getting back."

But when she turned back the wind came rushing in her face and took her breath and nearly blew her down.

"Well," she changed her mind. "I guess I won't. Friday, where are you-you must be somewhere out in this sudden storm, too. And if I could only find you I wouldn't feel as lost and shaky as I do now. Misery loves company-not that I'm miserable-but something"-she choked back a sob, "something seems to be gloomy in my heart."

Since she could not go back, and since the thought of coming up with Friday was a very comforting one, she plodded on, winking the snow out of her eyes and shaking it off of her cap and out of her hair.

She could scarcely see the tracks ahead of her now, as the new snow was fast obliterating them, and her own steps were made with increasing difficulty. Anyone who has ever tried to snow-shoe over soft, new-fallen snow knows the hardship of Peggy's predicament.

All at once she discovered that she could not lift her left foot at all.

Try as she would, it would not rise and swing forward to its next step.-Paralyzed! The horror of her situation, there all alone in the cold and snow, out of sight of everybody, slowly being paralyzed with no one to know or care, filled her with momentary hopelessness.

"Oh, Friday," she thought, "I don't see how you could have snow-shoed so far ahead of me as not to have been caught up with by now. Dear, dear, if I could only find that girl, maybe she would try to drag me to some farm house, or something. If she's one of the Andrews girls she wouldn't want me to freeze to death out here all by myself. Maybe if I called very loud she'd hear and come back-"

"h.e.l.lo!" she shouted forth into the snow-filled world. But there was no answer and the sound of her own voice, so hollow and lonely, did anything but cheer her up, so she did not try again.

With one last great effort of will she tried to move the stubborn left foot. It was useless,-stuck in the snow and helpless it remained.

"Oh," she murmured, the tears beginning to run down her cheeks to mingle with the wet snow flakes melting there.

All of a sudden a dark form loomed up out of the blinding snow immediately ahead. There was the jar of a collision. Peggy clutched her hands together, not knowing whether to be glad or terrified.

And then she saw that the figure was that of a very red-faced young man, who was also wearing snow-shoes.

"Friday!" Peggy cried out, realizing in one illuminating instant that this was the track-maker she had been following as Crusoe.

"No, it's Sat.u.r.day," replied the young man, somewhat puzzled, "but I don't see what that has to do with it. I'm awfully afraid I hurt you, b.u.mping into you like that, but I never dreamed there was anyone about in a storm like this. Have you seen anything of a little dog? I lost him a while back."

"No," shivered Peggy. "I'm afraid there isn't much use looking for him if he's very little. Here am I a perfectly strong girl and yet even I can't go any farther. I-can't-go-another-step-" Sobs fought with her words, and the young good-looking face grew redder than ever.

"Tired?" he asked, "so tired that you can't walk? Well, then, I'm mighty glad I came. Wait just a minute till I get a deep breath and I'll carry you. The extra weight will make us sink in a lot in this soft snow, but if you don't mind the joggly walking I can easily manage-"

Peggy shook her head. "No, you'd better go on by yourself," she insisted. "I think a person would be awfully hard to carry in snow-shoes, they'd hang down and flop about so. And I'm sorry about your poor little dog, but I think it isn't any use your waiting for him.

You'd much better save yourself," she advised.

"Now,-come," said the other.

"Listen, I'm paralyzed," Peggy confessed. "My left foot just won't-won't work, you know, I can't get it to snow-shoe another step. It just stays still. It's paralyzed-"

What was that-could she believe her eyes? The young man had glanced down sympathetically enough toward the paralyzed foot but was it any subject for such wild fits of mirth as he immediately went into? Was it right that he should laugh and laugh and point, speechless, and then clap his hand over his mouth and go off again?

"You are very cruel and perfectly horrid," cried Peggy sharply, "and I hate, I _hate_ you!"

"O-oh, pardon me, little Hot-Temper, but look back at your snow-shoe, _please_," and the laugh distorted his face once more.

Painfully and indignantly Peggy screwed her cold face over her left shoulder and looked down.

"Why-why," she gasped all out of breath, with astonishment, "how did it get there?"

For there, comfortably ensconced on the back of her snow-shoe, waiting for a free ride, sat, as perky as you please a plump puppy, his head c.o.c.ked interestedly on one side, and his wide mouth open in an inquiring fashion as if he would like to know what she was going to do about it now that she had found him out.

"The-the-smart little thing!" Peggy couldn't help exclaiming. "There he was, being a parasite, while I was supposed to do the walking.-Only it's a good joke on him, as I couldn't."

"As soon as the soft snow fell, I suppose the little fellow sank in pretty deep every step," the young man grinned, stooping and sweeping the quivering, frisking body into his arms. "And the rascal was going to take it easy as soon as he saw your snow-shoes coming along. Lucky I missed him when I did,-and you're not paralyzed now, are you?"

"No," laughed Peggy, "it seems I'm not. Oh, wasn't that funny? There I was dying all by myself a minute ago of something that I didn't have at all."

"I say, what we ought to do, though-there is a tea house somewhere near here where we can get something hot and then you'll feel a lot better and I don't mind saying that I will too. Come on, I know the way, and I'll walk on the windy side of you like this and-why, it's going fine, we'll be there in no time."

With courage and interest and even happiness surging back into her heart now that this big handsome boy was striding along by her side and cheering her with laughing remarks that ignored the wild storm about them, Peggy found snow-shoeing exhilarating once more, and they made good time, and were soon stamping in to the little tea house.

In the neighborhood of Andrews were a number of tea rooms and dainty restaurants, for it was a rich school, and a good share of the girls'

pocket-money went for good things to eat. Peggy was familiar with many of them, but she had never happened to come here before. So she knew that they must be a greater distance from the school than she had supposed. Also, most of the people seated around the adorable little tables were boys instead of girls, and they all looked up with interest at the entrance of the snowy pair.

"Why, h.e.l.lo, Jim," one of the boys called out to Peggy's companion.

"Playing Santa Claus?"

Jim merely smiled and bowed, and guided Peggy to a table by a roaring open fire. Then he took her sweater and cap and flung them across a chair to dry.

"Where do all these boys come from?" inquired Peggy. "It looks like a perfect wilderness around here."

"We are near Anderwood, the boys' prep school," explained her companion.

"I used to go there-just last year, in fact-and I was over visiting some of my friends to-day. Most of the fellows are having exams right now, you know, and there were two hours this afternoon when every fellow I knew was booked for something, so I borrowed a pair of snow-shoes and a dog and-took a stroll."

"And you strolled right over to a girls' school," laughed Peggy.

"As fast as I could go," the young man answered without embarra.s.sment.

"I'll tell you just what I was going to do, too. I don't know a soul at Andrews-or didn't until I almost ran over you in the storm. But I was just going to look at a certain window. Now, I bet you'd hate to tell me what you think of me."

"A certain window," mused Peggy. "Are you a carpenter and did you want to see how it was made?"

Her mischievous taunt brought an explanation.

"I'm an Amherst man," he began, and Peggy leaned her elbows on the table, forgetful of the steaming soup that had just been set before her.

"And I had finished my exams, so I took a vacation to this part of the country, where I used to go to school. The last time I was around here I came up for the game, early in the fall. And-well, you know how it is with glee club fellows, they sing their heads off when their team has won, and I guess we serenaded every corner of the Andrews dorms until midnight. Do you remember-did you happen to be awake and hear us?"

"Oh, yes," breathed Peggy ecstatically, and then a furious flush went over her face. Was her awful adventure of that evening to be recalled now-would he guess that she-_she_, whom he had saved from the storm was the very one who had toppled the terrible rose-tree in its heavy jardiniere down onto his head as if she were firing on him from a Zeppelin? So he was one of the young men she had nearly killed! What a mercy that he had not died, after all. With a crushing wave of memory, the whole moonlit scene flashed back to her, and once more the ache of uncertainty and remorse were poignant in her heart. She recalled Katherine's joyous shout that they were unharmed, and then-and then her own rush back to the window and the song they had sung just for her!

"You heard?" he was asking in pleasant interest. "Which house are you in?"

"Oh," cried Peggy in consternation. "The other one."

And then she realized by his puzzled expression and his mouth twitching into a laugh that her reply didn't make sense. "I mean I didn't hear it," she rushed headlong into the fib in her distress. "I didn't and my rose-tree is still all safe in its jardiniere in my room, and-and-anyway you must realize that it was an accident!" she finished desperately.