Margaret did not want to stare at it, and no more did we. But it was
more comfortable to talk with the chair standing still; for though to
look at one going it seems to crawl along like a snail, I can tell you
to keep up with it you have to step out pretty fast, faster than
Peterkin could manage without a bit of running every minute or so, which
is certainly _not_ comfortable, and faster than I myself could manage as
well as talking, without getting short of breath.

So we were very glad to pull up for a few minutes, though we had already
got through a good deal of business, as I will tell you.

Margaret had made up her mind to run away! Fancy that--a little girl of
eight!

Pete and I were awfully startled when she burst out with it. She could
stand Miss Bogle and the dreadful dulness and loneliness of Rock Terrace
no longer, she declared, not to speak of what might happen to her in the
way of being turned into a kitten or a mouse or _something_, if the
witch got really too spiteful.

'And where will you go to?' we asked.

'Home,' she said, 'at least to my nursey's, and that is close to home.'

We were so puzzled at this that we could scarcely speak.

'To your _nurse's_!' we said at last.

'Yes, to my own nurse--my old nurse!' said Margaret, quite surprised
that we didn't understand. And then she explained what she thought she
had told us.

'That stupid thing who is my nurse now,' she said, 'isn't my _real_
nurse. I mean she has only been with me since I came here. She belongs
to Miss Bogle--I mean Miss Bogle got her. My own darling nursey had to
leave me. She stayed and stayed because of that bad cold I got, you
know, but as soon as I was better she _had_ to go, because her mother
was so old and ill, and hasn't _nobody_ but nursey to take care of her.
And then when Gran had to go away he settled it all with that witchy
Miss Bogle, and she got this goosey nurse, and my own nursey brought me
here. And she cried and cried when she went away, and she said she'd
come some day to see if I was happy, but the witch said no, she mustn't,
it would upset me; and so she's never dared to; and now you can fancy
what my life has been,' Margaret finished up, in quite a triumphant
tone.

Peterkin was nearly crying by this time. But I knew I must be very
sensible. It all seemed so very serious.

'But what will your grandfather say when he knows you've run away?' I
asked, while Peterkin stood listening, with his mouth wid