Peggy from Kerry by L.T. Meade

Although Miss Archdale spoke very soothingly to wild Peggy she did not feel so comfortable as her words seemed to imply. She was a very clever and very conscientious woman, and saw immediately that a very strong new element had come into the Lower School with the advent of Peggy. Whether it was for good or evil remained to be proved. Miss Archdale was wise enough to know that the best teachers in the world can only guide girls; they can only, so to speak, give them a little push here and a little nudge there in the direction in which they are to go. The girl is really, when all is said and done, her own teacher, her own guide; if she chooses to follow the paths of evil, not all the accomplishments in the world, not all the knowledge, not all the loving-kindness, can keep her back. God, inside the girl, must be the propelling force for good; and, alas! Satan inside the girl must be equally the propelling force for evil. Because Miss Archdale recognised this fact she was an admirable and efficient and dearly loved teacher; and because Mrs. Fleming recognised the same fact even in greater fullness she had made The Red Gables the school that it was. Miss Archdale, to all appearance, had taken little or no notice of The Imp and her ways. She called her Kitty Merrydew, and was consistently kind to her.

Kitty's conduct was always excellent before her teachers. She learnt her numerous tasks with the ease of very pronounced talent; she was a favourite with the occasional masters and mistresses who came to the school, for her music was decidedly above the average, and so also was her drawing and painting. She had a perfect genius for caricature, and could make thumbnail sketches of the different girls and mistresses in a way which convulsed the school with mirth. These caricatures she kept, however, carefully hidden from the eyes of the mistresses. Kitty could tell a story better than anybody else, she could sing a song to "bring down the house," she could act to perfection, and here her powers of mimicry did her immense service. Up to the present Miss Archdale had left The Imp more or less alone; she knew that the girl was peculiar, difficult, and that she had a power in her which seemed to be more directed to evil than to good; but, nevertheless, up to the present she knew that she had no right to interfere. The Imp was The Imp, and as she seemed not to cause any unhappiness, and was on the whole more a favourite than the reverse, she judiciously let her alone. But now things were different. The new girl was a power to be reckoned with, and already between the new girl and Kitty Merrydew open war had been declared. Miss Archdale was truly thankful that Peggy's bed had been made up for her in the lower dormitory, where some quiet, well-behaved little girls slept. She would have altered matters at once had things been different, and had the child been put into the dormitory where Kitty Merrydew and the Dodds, her satellites, were placed.