Produced by Suzanne Shell, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net Secret History Revealed by Lady Peggy O'Malley By C. N. & A. M. WILLIAMSON Author of "The Lightning Conductor Discovers America," "A Soldier of the Legion," "Lady Betty Across the Water," Etc. With Frontispiece in Colors By CLARENCE ROWE A. L. BURT COMPANY Publishers New York Published by arrangements with Doubleday, Page and Company _Copyright, 1915, by_ C. N. & A. M. Williamson _All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign languages, including the Scandinavian_ [Illustration: _"As I kicked it away, one of the slippers flew off and seemed spitefully to follow the coat."_] CHAPTER I If I didn't tell this, nobody else ever would; certainly not Diana, nor Major Vandyke--still less Eagle himself--I mean Captain Eagleston March; and they and I are the only ones who know, except a few such people as presidents and secretaries of war and generals, who never tell anything even under torture. Besides, there is the unofficial part. Without that, the drama would be like a play in three acts, with the first and third acts chopped off. The presidents and secretaries of war and generals know nothing about the unofficial part. It's strange how the biggest things of life grow out of the tiniest ones. There _is_ the old simile of the acorn and the oak, for instance. But oaks take a long time to grow, and everybody concerned in oak culture is calmly expecting them to do it. Imagine an acorn exploding to let out an oak huge enough to shadow the world! If, two years ago, when I was sixteen, I hadn't wanted money to buy a white frock with roses on it, which I saw in Selfridge's window, a secret crisis between the United States and Mexico would have been avoided; and the career of a splendid soldier would not have been broken. One month before I met the white dress, Diana and Father and I had come from home--that's Ballyconal--to see what good we could do with a season in London; good for Diana, I mean, and I put her before Father because he does so himself. Every one else he puts far, far behind, like the beasts following Noah into the Ark. Not that I'm sure, without looking them up, that they did follow Noah. But if it had been Father, he would have arranged it in that way, to escape seeing their ugly faces or smelling those who were not nice to smell.