Chapter I: The Arrival

One summer afternoon many years ago a child, called Peggy Roberts, arrived at the door of her aunt’s house in an open carriage. Peggy was just eight years old. She had been in the train since early in the morning, and was very tired when the carriage stopped at the door of Seafield. Then she noticed that everything round her was new and different from things at home, and she forgot about feeling tired. The house was exactly like the tea-caddy that stood on the dining-room side-board at home, and had been brought from China by her uncle—that is to say, it was quite square, and you felt as if you could lift off the top like the lid of the tea-caddy.

Right up to the windows there grew such a lovely rose-tree, covered all over with branches of bright red roses.

“O Martin, let me get some of the roses!” Peggy cried, standing still on the steps of the house.

Martin was her aunt’s maid, a stout, cross-looking woman, who always refused to allow Peggy to do anything she wanted.

“No, no, Miss Peggy, come in for your tea; the roses are far too high up,” she said. Peggy looked up at the beautiful dangling branches, and her mouth went down at the corners; she thought nothing would make her happy unless she got one of them.

It must have been because she was so tired that she began to cry about nothing in this way. The coachman was more good-natured than Martin, however, for he stood up on the box of the carriage and gathered a bunch of the roses. “Here, missie,” he said, leaning down from his high seat, and handing them to Peggy.

“Oh! oh! oh!” Peggy cried, burying her nose in the lovely red bunch.

But then something horrid happened: a whole family of great, fat, brown earwigs came hurrying and dropping out of the roses, in the greatest speed to get away. Down went the roses on to the steps, and Peggy cried in earnest now.

There was nothing she hated like earwigs, and to have a whole nest of them fall out on her frock was too much for her altogether. And then Martin was so pleased.

“See there, Miss Peggy; that’s what you get for wanting to pick flowers!” she said. But she did brush away the earwigs, and stamped upon the biggest of them to Peggy’s great disgust. Then they went into the house, and she had to speak to her aunt; and, of course, she had nothing to say to her.

Tea was on the table. A different kind of bread was there from the home-bread Peggy knew. She went and stood beside the table and looked at it, then put out her finger and touched it.

“Don’t touch things on the table!” said Aunt Euphemia.

“I’m sorry!” said Peggy, and wanted to cry again. But the door opened, and such an exceedingly nice cat came walking in, just as if the house belonged to it, that she forgot all about crying.

She ran to the cat, and went down on her knees on the carpet to stroke him.

“He is called Patrick,” said Aunt Euphemia; “take care that he does not scratch you.”

But Patrick did not mean to scratch. He rubbed his big yellow face against Peggy in the most friendly way, and then walked to the tea-table and jumped up on a chair and mewed twice, very loudly, exactly as if he were asking for his tea.

“Patrick is very punctual,” said Aunt Euphemia.

She poured out a saucer of milk for him, and put it on the floor. Peggy sat down on the carpet to watch him take it. His little red tongue was so rough and funny, she laughed out aloud at seeing it dart in and out of the milk. Patrick never paused for a minute till he had licked the saucer so dry that you would have thought it had been washed. Then he licked his long, yellow whiskers, and walked away to the other end of the room, jumped on to the sofa, and was fast asleep in a minute. Peggy wanted to waken him, and make him play with her; but Aunt Euphemia wouldn’t allow her. As her own tea was brought in at that moment, however, she became interested in it.

Martin came in with Peggy’s pinafore, and glanced at the tea-tray while she put it on. “I’ll just bring a kitchen cup for Miss Peggy,” she said, adding aside to Aunt Euphemia, “_She’s an awfu’ breaker!_”

Peggy blushed hotly. She knew that she often broke things, but it was horrid of Martin to remind Aunt Euphemia of it just then. She had wanted to take tea out of one of those nice cups with the roses on them; it wouldn’t taste a bit nice out of a kitchen cup. But it was of no use to object. Martin always had her way, so the kitchen cup was brought, and an ugly kitchen plate also. It was wonderful how good tea tasted after all, and the strange bread had a nice salt taste, and the strawberry jam was different too. Altogether, Peggy enjoyed tea very much.

When it was done, she went across to the sofa to see what Patrick was doing. He opened his green eyes, and looked at her sleepily. One of his paws was lying out on the cushion. Peggy took it up in her hand and felt the funny little pads of black skin on his feet. She knew, because she had a cat at home, that if you give a cat’s paw ever such a tiny squeeze with your hand, its claws pop out from between the little pads of black skin. She had sometimes done it to old Tuffy at home; so she gave Patrick’s paw the tiniest squeeze possible, just to see the claws slide out from their sheaths. But instead of receiving this in Tuffy’s kind way, Patrick put out his paw in a furious rage at her, and buried all his claws in her arm. Oh, what a howl Peggy gave, and what long, red scratches appeared down her arm! Then Patrick jumped down from his pillow with an angry fizz, and walked out of the room.

Aunt Euphemia rang the bell without a word.

“Martin,” she said, “put Miss Peggy to bed; she has been teasing Patrick!”

And Peggy, sobbing with pain, went off to bed.