ned, for this seemed
to promise better.

"It was when Pa first took up the claim," said Peggy. "The country was
pretty wild then,--Indians about, and a good many big beasts: panthers,
and mountain lions, and so on. I was the only girl, and I was two years
old. Pa used to be out on the claim all day, and the boys with him, all
except Hugh, and he was in bed at that time; and Ma used to work in the
garden, and keep me by her so that I wouldn't get into mischief.

"One day she was picking currants, and I had been sitting by her,
playing with some hollyhock flowers she had given me. She did not notice
when I crawled away, but suddenly she heard me give a queer sort of
scream. She turned round, and there was a big panther dragging me off
down the garden path by my dress. Ma felt as if she was dead for a
minute; but then she ran back to the seed-house--it was only a few steps
off--and got a hoe that she knew was there, and tore off after the
panther. It wasn't going very fast, for I was a pretty heavy baby, and
it didn't know at first that any one was after it. When it heard Ma
coming it started off quicker, and had almost got to the woods when she
caught up. Ma raised that hoe and brought it down on the beast's head as
hard as she knew how. It dropped me, and turned on her, grinning and
snarling, and curling its claws all ready for a spring. She never
stopped to draw breath; she raised the hoe again, and that time, she
says, she prayed to the swing of it; and she brought it down, and heard
the creature's skull go crash under it, and felt the hoe sink in. The
panther gave a scream and rolled over, and then Ma rolled over too; and
when Pa came home to dinner, a few minutes later, they were both lying
there still, and I was trying to pick up my hollyhock flowers. We have
never had hollyhocks since then; Ma can't bear 'em."

There was no doubt about the effect of Peggy's story. Before it was
finished Rita was sitting bolt upright, her chinchilla robe thrown back,
her hands clasped over her knee, her eyes alight with interest; and
Margaret cried, "Oh, Peggy, Peggy, what a splendid story!"

"Well, it's true!" said Peggy.

"Of course it is; that's the splendid part. Oh, I am so proud to have an
aunt so brave and strong. Aunt--why, Peggy, you have never told me your
mother's name!"

"You never asked," said Peggy. "Her name is Susan."

Margaret blushed, and mentally applied the scourge to herself. It was
true; she never had a