r. Stand by the Innocent this
evening, will you, if she should get into trouble? I am sent for to the
study, and shall be in for a good hour's lecture, and then bed."

"What do you mean, Goat? What is it?" asked both girls, anxiously. But
the Goat was gone.

* * * * *

Peggy was enjoying herself extremely. She had learned all her lessons,
for a wonder, and now she had curled herself up in a corner with the
"Jungle Book," and the rest of the world was forgotten. There was
nobody, there never had been anybody, but Mowgli and the Wolves. She had
hunted with them, she had slain Shere-Khan, she had talked with Baloo
and Bagheera. Her outdoor nature had responded in every fibre to the
call of the Master of Magic, and he filled her with joy and wonder. As
the Snowy had said, the worlds were opening, and the doors thereof.

Things being thus with her, she hardly heard her own door open softly.
Before she had torn her eyes from the enchanted page, the room was
filled with silent, flitting figures--as it had been often filled
before. The girls nodded to her with silent laughter and friendly
gestures. In another moment they would have been at the window; but
Peggy was not dreaming now. In an instant she had sprung from her corner
among the cushions, and stood before the window, with arms outspread.
"No!" she said.

The girls recoiled, paused, in amazement. There were six of them: the
two V's, Blanche Haight, and three other sophomores. Peggy saw with a
throb of joy that Grace Wolfe was not among them. That would have made
it harder.

"What does this mean?" asked Vivia Varnham, with her cold smile. "You
have never made any trouble before, Peggy; isn't it rather late in the
day?"

"Oh, she's only in fun!" cried Viola Vincent. "Aren't you, Veezy-vee?
Why, she's acting, girls, and she does it elegantly. It's perf'ly fine,
Veezy-vee. I didn't know you had it in you."

"No, I am not acting," said Peggy, quietly. "I am sorry, girls, but you
can't go out. You never can go out again, so long as I am here."

"Upon my word!" cried Blanche Haight, who had not spoken yet. "This
seems to be a pretty state of things. Perhaps you are not aware, Miss
Montfort, that this exit was used, long before you came to adorn the
school with your presence. We acknowledge no right of yours to forbid us
the use of it. Stand out of the way, please."

For a reply, Peggy backed against the window; her face assumed an
exp