at all. Why had she been so sure she had? Or was she herself busy being a snob, attributing to Carolyn airs that she herself would have taken on in the same situation? She had to admit that the possibility existed.
“Okay,” she said. “She’ll be up sometime in the middle of the morning.” She hesitated, then went on. “And maybe this afternoon I could come up myself. We haven’t had a talk for a long time.”
“Could you?” Carolyn asked. “Oh, Eileen, that would be wonderful. What time?”
Eileen thought quickly. “How about three-ish? I have to do lunch at the Hen, but it’s a split shift. I don’t have to be back until seven.”
“Great!” Carolyn agreed.
When she hung up a moment later, Eileen grinned happily at Peggy. “Looks like the drought’s over,” she said. “You can go up anytime you want.”
Peggy, winded from the hike up the hill, paused when she came through the gates of Hilltop, and stared at the mansion while she caught her breath. It still seemed to her impossible that anybody could really live in it. But Beth? That was really weird. Beth should still be living on Cherry Street, where they could run back and forth between each other’s houses four or five times a day. Up here, just the driveway was longer than the whole distance between their houses used to be.
She started toward the front door, then changed her mind, and skirted around to the far end of the house. Somewhere, she knew, there had to be a back door, and all her life she’d been used to using her friends’ back doors. You only went to the front door on special occasions.
Finally she found the little terrace behind the kitchen, and knocked loudly on the screen door. A moment later, Beth herself appeared on the other side of the door. “I knew you’d come around here,” she said, holding the door open so Peggy could come into the kitchen. “Want a doughnut or something?”
Peggy nodded mutely, and Beth helped herself from the plate on the kitchen table, handing one to the other girl. “Come on,” she said. “Let’s get out of here. I want to show you something.” They pushed the screen door open, and let it slam behind them, Beth calling out an apology even before Hannah could admonish her. Then, with Peggy following behind, Beth led her back around the corner of the house, and across the lawn toward the trail to the mausoleum.
Patches snorted, pawed at the stable floor, then stretched her neck out over the half-door, whinnying eagerly.
“Not yet,” Tracy Sturgess told the big mare. “Not till I’m done grooming you.” She gave the horse’s lead a quick jerk, but instead of obediently backing away from the door, the horse only snorted again, and tossed her head, jerking the lead from Tracy’s hand.
“Stop it!” Tracy snapped, grabbing for the lead, but missing. “Peter! Come make Patches hold still.”
“In a minute,” Peter called from the other end of the stable.
“Now!” Tracy demanded. She moved carefully around Patches, then grasped the horse’s halter, and tried to pull her back into the stall. Again, the horse snorted, reared slightly, and tried to pull away.
“What’s wrong with you?” Tracy asked. Then, her hand still clutching the halter, she looked out into the paddock to see what had attracted the mare’s attention. The paddock, though, was empty.
Tracy raised her eyes, and then, past the rose garden, saw the movement that had distracted the horse.
It was Beth, walking across the lawn with someone else, a girl Tracy didn’t recognize. Tracy frowned, then jerked the horse’s lead again. Patches whinnied a loud protest, but a moment later Peter came into the stall, took the lead from Tracy, and gently pulled the animal away from the door. Tracy remained where she was, staring out at the retreating figures of the two girls.
“Who’s that?” she asked, her back still to Peter.
“Who?”
“That girl with Beth.”
Peter shrugged. “My sister. Her name’s Peggy.”
Now Tracy turned around to glare angrily at the stableboy. “Who cares what her name is? What’s she doing up here?”
Peter reddened slightly. He’d known this would happen. Now he’d be in trouble for sure. “Beth invited her up.”
“Who said she could do that?” Tracy demanded. “This isn’t her house. She doesn’t have the right to invite people up here.”
“Her mom said it was okay. She said Peggy could come up anytime she wanted to.”
“Well, she can’t!” Tracy exclaimed. “And I’m going to tell her so!” She stamped out