l reached the breaking-point; she slipped from Peg's arms
to the chair and on to the floor and lay quite still.

Peg knelt down beside her:

"She's fainted. Stand back--give her air--get some water, some
smelling-salts--quick--don't stand there lookin' at her: do somethin'!"

Peg loosened Ethel's dress and talked to her all the while, and Jerry
and Alaric hurried out in different directions in quest of restoratives.

Mrs. Chichester came toward Ethel, thoroughly alarmed and upset.

But Peg would not let her touch the inanimate girl.

"Go away from her!" cried Peg hysterically.

"What good do ye think ye can do her? What do you know about her? You
don't know anything about yer children--ye don't know how to raise
them. Ye don't know a thought in yer child's mind. Why don't ye sit
down beside her sometimes and find out what she, thinks and who she
sees? Take her hand in yer own and get her to open her soul to ye! Be a
mother to her! A lot you know about motherhood! I want to tell ye me
father knows more about motherhood than any man in the wurrld."

Poor Mrs. Chichester fell back, crushed and humiliated from Peg's
onslaught.

In a few moments the two men returned with water and salts. After a
while Ethel opened her eyes and looked up at Peg. Peg, fearful lest she
should begin to accuse herself again, helped her up the stairs to her
own room and there she sat beside the unstrung, hysterical girl until
she slept, her hand locked in both of Peg's.

Promising to call in the morning, Jerry left.

The mother and son returned to their rooms.

The house was still again.

But how much had happened that night that went to shaping the
characters and lives of these two young girls, who were first looking
out at life with the eyes and minds of swiftly advancing womanhood! One
thing Peg had resolved: she would not spend another night in the
Chichester home.

Her little heart was bruised and sore. The night had begun so happily:
it had ended so wretchedly.

And to think the one person in whom she trusted had been just amusing
himself with her, leading her to believe he was a farmer--"less than
that" he had once said, and all the time he was a man of breeding and
of birth and of title.

Poor Peg felt so humiliated that she made up her mind she would never
see him again.

In the morning she would go back to the one real affection of her
life--to the min who never hurt or disappointed her--her father.

CHAPTER