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offices of Colonel John Williams, commander of the St. Joseph Military District; and General John Bassett, the provost marshal, whose job it was to find and arrest spies and Rebs. Uncomfortably, Peg thought about Miss Hennessey’s cousin James. In a way, like it or not, Peg had helped him to escape. Luckily the provost marshal would never find out about it. Peg would hate to be sent to prison.
    Eager to take another look at the elegant lobby with its beautiful red Brussels carpets and carved, winding staircase, Peg clattered across the wooden sidewalk and held out a hand to grasp the handle of the heavy door.
    “Stop!” a voice ordered.
    Peg froze, her hand dropping to her side. She looked up at the Union soldier who had appeared out of nowhere to block the door.
    “You have no business here, little girl,” he said. “Get along home.”
    “I just wanted to see the lobby of the hotel,” Peg told him. “It used to be beautiful.”
    “I don’t know what it used to look like,” the soldier answered, “but it sure ain’t beautiful anymore.”
    Peg didn’t answer. Tears blurring her vision, she turned and fled.
    When the buggy arrived Peg was caught in a whirl of profuse thanks and hugs. Miss Hennessey leaned forward to give one last wave, then was gone.
    “She didn’t say she’d see us again,” Peg complained. “She didn’t ask us to come to Mrs. Kling’s boardinghouse to visit her.” A hurt tear slid down her nose, and she angrily brushed it away.
    Ma put an arm around Peg’s shoulders and steered her to the parlor sofa. As they sat close together Ma said, “Miss Hennessey needed us for only a short time, love. She doesn’t need us now.”
    “It’s not a matter of needing us. I thought she was my—our friend.”
    “Only a few friendships last forever. You’ll find, as you grow older, that most friendships come and go.”
    Peg squirmed away from her mother’s arm. “There you go again, Ma, talking as if I’m a child.”
    “You’ll have to admit that you don’t know all there is to know at the age of eleven.” Ma gave Peg a teasing smile, and, in spite of her irritation, Peg couldn’t keep from smiling back.
    As she settled against her mother’s arm, Pegthought about Miss Hennessey, who at first had been nervous and frail and frightened of her own shadow. During the week, as Miss Hennessey’s health improved, she had seemed at times, in quick unguarded moments, to be as self-assured as Ma or Miss Thomas, which was totally at odds with her usual quiet, timid nature. Peg remembered that instant on the stairs in which Miss Hennessey had appeared to be a vibrant, handsome woman, and she thought of the resonant beauty of her voice as she read aloud
A Tale of Two Cities.
Surely, Peg wondered, she hadn’t imagined all that. Or had she?
    Well, it scarcely mattered now. Miss Hennessey had left, and Peg had lost a friend. “I’ll bring down the towels and the sheets from her bed,” Peg said and climbed to her feet.
    “You’re a good, dear girl,” Ma told her.
    Peg didn’t feel like a good, dear girl. She felt like kicking the table leg, or raising a ruckus, or chasing Marcus all the way home, the way she had when he’d called her a skinny ninny.
    It wasn’t until she’d scooped up an armful of linens that a glint of metal caught her eye and she noticed one of Miss Hennessey’s shawls that had fallen behind the chair in the corner. A small, circular, silver pin was still attached.
    Peg folded and smoothed the shawl, laid it on top of the linens, and took it downstairs to give to Ma.
    “It’s getting late, so I’ll send it to her tomorrow,” Ma said, then paused and smiled at Peg. “Better yet, when you come home from school, could you take it to her?”
    “Oh, yes!” Peg answered quickly. She’d love an excuse to see Miss Hennessey again. Maybe by tomorrow afternoon Miss Hennessey would have realized thatMrs. Kling’s boardinghouse wasn’t as comfortable and homey as the Murphys’