← catalogue

Betty Vivian: A Story of Haddo Court School

by L. T. Meade · English · Gutenberg #25510 · 558,261 chars · public domain (US)

The Project Gutenberg eBook of Betty Vivian: A Story of Haddo Court School
    
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.

Title: Betty Vivian: A Story of Haddo Court School

Author: L. T. Meade


        
Release date: May 18, 2008 [eBook #25510]
                Most recently updated: January 3, 2021

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/25510

Credits: Produced by D Alexander, the Marriott Library Rare Book
        Collection at the University of Utah, and the Online
        Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This
        book was produced from scanned images of public domain
        material from the Google Print project.)


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BETTY VIVIAN: A STORY OF HADDO COURT SCHOOL ***




Produced by D Alexander, the Marriott Library Rare Book
Collection at the University of Utah, and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This
book was produced from scanned images of public domain
material from the Google Print project.)









Betty Vivian

_A Story of Haddo Court School_

By MRS. L. T. MEADE

Author of

"The Harmon Girls," "The Princess of the Revels," "Aylwyn's
Friends," "The School Queens," "Seven Maids," Etc.

[Illustration]

A. L. BURT, COMPANY, PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK




CONTENTS

Chapter                                                           Page


     I. YES OR NO                                                   3
    II. WAS FANNY ELATED?                                          14
   III. GOING SOUTH                                                25
    IV. RECEPTION AT HADDO COURT                                   36
     V. THE VIVIANS' ATTIC                                         49
    VI. A CRISIS                                                   64
   VII. SCOTCH HEATHER                                             80
  VIII. A NEW MEMBER                                               91
    IX. STRIVING FOR A DECISION                                   104
     X. RULE I. ACCEPTED                                          120
    XI. A SPECIALITY ENTERTAINMENT                                133
   XII. A VERY EVENTFUL DAY                                       137
  XIII. A SPOKE IN HER WHEEL                                      151
   XIV. TEA AT FARMER MILES'S                                     169
    XV. A GREAT DETERMINATION                                     180
   XVI. AFTERWARDS                                                194
  XVII. A TURNING-POINT                                           224
 XVIII. NOT ACCEPTABLE                                            234
   XIX. "IT'S DICKIE!"                                            246
    XX. A TIME OF DANGER                                          254
   XXI. A RAY OF HOPE                                             266
  XXII. FARMER MILES TO THE RESCUE                                282
 XXIII. RESTORATION                                               290




BETTY VIVIAN




CHAPTER I

YES OR NO


Haddo Court had been a great school for girls for many generations. In
fact, for considerably over a century the Court had descended from
mother to daughter, who invariably, whatever her husband's name, took
the name of Haddo when she became mistress of the school. The reigning
mistress might sometimes be unmarried, sometimes the reverse; but she
was always, in the true sense of the word, a noble, upright, generous
sort of woman, and one slightly in advance of her generation. There had
never been anything low or mean known about the various head mistresses
of Haddo Court. The school had grown with the times. From being in the
latter days of the eighteenth century a rambling, low old-fashioned
house with mullioned windows and a castellated roof, it had gradually
increased in size and magnificence; until now, when this story opens, it
was one of the most imposing mansions in the county.

The locality in which Haddo Court was situated was not very far from
London; but for various reasons its name will be withheld from the
reader, although doubtless the intelligent girl who likes to peruse
these pages will be easily able to discover its whereabouts. Haddo
Court, although within a measurable distance of the great metropolis,
had such large grounds, and such a considerable area of meadow and
forest land surrounding it, that it truly seemed to the girls who lived
there that they were in the heart of the country itself. This was indeed
the case; for from the Court you could see no other house whatsoever,
unless it were the picturesque abode of the head gardener or that of the
lodge-keeper.

The school belonged to no company; it was the sole and undivided
possession of the head mistress. It combined the advantages of a
first-class high school with the advantages that the best type of
private school affords. Its rooms were lofty and abundantly supplied
with bright sunshine and fresh air. So popular was the school, and such
a tone of distinction did it confer upon the girls who were educated
there, that, although Mrs. Haddo did not scruple to expect high fees
from her pupils, it was as difficult to get into Haddo Court as it was
for a boy to become an inmate of Winchester or Eton. The girl whose
mother before her had been educated at the Court usually put down her
little daughter's name for admission there shortly after the child's
birth, and even then she was not always certain that the girl could be
received; for Mrs. Haddo, having inherited, among other virtues from a
long line of intelligent ancestors, great firmness of character, made
rules which she would allow no exception to break.

The girls at Haddo Court might number one hundred and fifty; but nothing
would induce her, on any terms whatsoever, to exceed that number. She
had a staff of the most worthy governesses, many of whom had been
educated at the Court itself; others who bore testimony to the lamented
and much-loved memory of the late Miss Beale of Cheltenham; and others,
again, who had taken honors of the highest degree at the two
universities.

Mrs. Haddo never prided herself on any special gift; but she was well
aware of the fact that she could read character with unerring instinct;
consequently she never made a mistake in the choice of her teachers. The
Court was now so large that each girl, if she chose, could have a small
bedroom to herself, or two sisters might be accommodated with a larger
room to share together. There was every possible comfort at the Court;
at the same time there was an absence of all that was enervating.
Comforts, Mrs. Haddo felt assured, were necessary to the proper growth
and development of a young life; but she disliked luxuries for herself,
and would not permit them for her pupils. The rooms were therefore
handsomely, though somewhat barely, furnished. There were no superfluous
draperies and few knick-knacks of any sort. There was, however, in each
bedroom a little book shelf with about a dozen of the best and most
suitable books--generally a copy of Ruskin's "Sesame and Lilies," of
Carlyle's "Sartor Resartus," of Milton's "Paradise Lost"; also one or
two books by the best writers of the present day. Works of E. V. Lucas
were not forgotten in that collection, and Mrs. Ewing's "Jackanapes" was
a universal favorite.

The girls had one special library where classical works and books of
reference were found in abundance; also standard novels, such as the
best works of Thackeray and Dickens. In addition to this was a smaller
library where the girls were allowed to have their own private
possessions in the shape of books and drawings. This room was only used
by the girls of the upper school, and was seldom interfered with either
by the head mistress or the various teachers.

Out of one hundred and fifty girls it would be impossible to describe
more than a few; but at the time when this story opens there was in the
upper school a little band of devoted friends who adored each other, who
had high aims and ambitions, who almost worshiped Mrs. Haddo, and, as
far as possible, endeavored to profit by her excellent training. The
names of the girls in question were Susie Rushworth, who was seventeen
years of age, and would in a year's time be leaving the Court; Fanny
Crawford, her cousin and special friend--Fanny and Susie were much of
the same age, Fanny being a little the younger of the two--two sisters
named Mary and Julia Bertram; Margaret Grant, who was tall, dark, and
stately, and Olive Repton, everybody's favorite, a bright-eyed,
bewitching little creature, with the merriest laugh, a gay manner, and
with brilliant powers of repartee and a good-natured word for every
one--she was, in short, the life of the upper school.

None of these girls was under sixteen years of age; all were slightly
above the average as regards ability, and decidedly above the average as
regards a very high standard of morals. They had all been brought up
with care. They knew nothing of the vanities of the world, and their
great ambition in life was to walk worthily in the station in which they
were born. They were all daughters of rich parents--that is, with the
exception of Olive Repton, whose mother was a widow, and who, in
consequence, could not give her quite so many advantages as her
companions received. Olive never spoke on the subject, but she had wild,
impossible dreams of earning her own living by and by. She was not
jealous nor envious of her richer schoolfellows. She was thoroughly
happy, and enjoyed her life to the utmost.

Among the teachers in the school was a certain Miss Symes, an
Englishwoman of very high attainments, with lofty ideas, and the
greatest desire to do the utmost for her pupils. Miss Symes was not more
than six-and-twenty. She was very handsome--indeed, almost
beautiful--and she had such a passion for music and such a lovely voice
that the girls liked to call her Saint Cecilia. Miss Arundel was another
teacher in the school. She was much older than Miss Symes, but not so
highly educated. She only occasionally came into the upper school--her
work was more with the girls of the lower school--but she was kind and
good-natured, and was universally popular because she could bear being
laughed at, and even enjoyed a joke against herself. Such a woman would
be sure to be a favorite with most girls, and Mary Arundel was as happy
in her life at the Court as any of her pupils. There were also French
and German governesses, and a lady to look after the wardrobes of the
older girls, and attend to them in case of any trifling indisposition.

Besides the resident teachers there was the chaplain and his wife. The
chaplain had his own quarters in a distant wing of the school. His name
was the Reverend Edmund Fairfax. He was an elderly man, with white hair,
a benign expression of face, and gentle brown eyes. His wife was a
somewhat fretful woman, who often wished that her husband would seek
preferment and leave his present circumscribed sphere of action. But
nothing would induce the Reverend Edmund Fairfax to leave Mrs. Haddo so
long as she required him; and when he read prayers morning and evening
in the beautiful old chapel, which had been built as far back as the
beginning of the eighteenth century, the girls loved to listen to his
words, and even at times shyly confided their little troubles to him.

Such was the state of things at Haddo Court when this story opens. Mrs.
Haddo was a woman of about thirty-eight years of age. She was tall and
handsome, of a somewhat commanding presence, with a face which was
capable, in repose, of looking a little stern; but when that same face
was lit up by a smile, the heart of every girl in the school went out to
her, and they thought no one else like her.

Mrs. Haddo was a widow, and had no children of her own. Her late husband
had been a great friend of Mr. Fairfax. At his death she had, after
careful reflection, decided to carry on the work which her mother had so
successfully conducted before her. Everything was going well, and there
was not a trace of care or anxiety on Mrs. Haddo's fine face.

There came a day, however, when this state of things was doomed to be
altered. There is no Paradise, no Garden of Eden, without its serpent,
and so Janet Haddo was destined to experience. The disturbing element
which came into the school was brought about in the most natural way.
Sir John Crawford, the father of one of Mrs. Haddo's favorite pupils,
called unexpectedly to see the good lady.

"I have just got the most exciting piece of news for you," he said.

"Indeed!" replied Mrs. Haddo.

She never allowed herself to be greatly disturbed, but her heart did
beat a trifle faster when she saw how eager Sir John appeared.

"I have come here all the way from Yorkshire in order not to lose a
moment," continued the good baronet. "I don't want to see Fanny at
present. This has nothing whatever to do with Fanny. I have come to tell
you that a wonderful piece of news has reached me."

"What can that be?" asked Mrs. Haddo. She spoke with that gracious calm
which always seemed to pervade her presence and her words.

"Do relieve my mind at once!" said Sir John. "Is it possible that
you--you, Mrs. Haddo, of Haddo Court--have at the present moment three
vacancies in your school?"

Mrs. Haddo laughed. "Is that all?" she said. "But they can be filled up
to-morrow ten times over, if necessary."

"But you _have_ three vacancies--three vacancies in the upper school? It
is true--I see it is true by your face. Please assure me on that point
without delay!"

"It happens to be true," said Mrs. Haddo, "although I do not want the
matter mentioned. My three dear young pupils, the Maitlands, have been
unable to return to school owing to the fact that their father has been
made Governor of one of the West India Islands. He has insisted on
taking his family out with him; so I have lost dear Emily, Jane, and
Agnes. I grieve very much at their absence. They all came to see me last
week to say good-bye; and we had quite a trying time, the children are
so affectionate. I should have greatly loved to keep them longer; but
their father was determined to have them with him, so there was nothing
to be done but submit."

"Oh, Mrs. Haddo, what is one person's loss is another person's gain!"

"I don't understand you, Sir John," was the good lady's reply.

"If you have three vacancies, you can take three more girls. You can
take them into the school at once, can you not?"

"I can, certainly; but, as a matter of fact, I am in no hurry. I shall
probably be obliged to fill up the vacancies next term from the list of
girls already on my books. I shall, as my invariable custom is, promote
some girls from the lower school to the upper, and take three new little
girls into the lower school. But there is really no hurry."

"Yes, but there is every hurry, my friend--every hurry! I want you to
take three--three _orphan_ girls--three girls who have neither father
nor mother; I want you to take them at once into the upper school. They
are not specially well off; but I am their guardian, and your terms
shall be mine. I have just come from the death-bed of their aunt, one of
my dearest friends; she was in despair about Betty and Sylvia and Hester
Vivian. They are three sisters. They have been well educated; and,
although I don't know them personally, any girl brought up by Frances
Vivian, my dear friend who has just passed away, could not but be in all
respects a desirable inmate of any school. I am forced to go to India
immediately, and must ask you to look after Fanny for me during the next
vacation. Now, if you would only take the Vivians I should go away with
a light heart. Do you say 'Yes,' my dear friend! Remember how many of my
name have been educated at Haddo Court. You cannot refuse me. I am
certain you will not."

"I never take girls here on the plea of friendship--even for one like
yourself, Sir John. I must know much more about these children before I
agree to admit them into my school."

Sir John's face became very red, and just for a minute he looked almost
angry.

"Oh, Mrs. Haddo," he said then, "do banish that alarmingly severe
expression from your face and look kindly on my project! I can assure
you that Frances Vivian, after whom my own Fanny has been called, had
the finest character in the world. Ah, my dear friend, I have you
now--her own sister was educated here. Now, isn't that guarantee enough?
Look back on the past, refer to the old school-books, and you will see
the name of Beatrice Vivian in the roll-call."

"What can you tell me about the girls themselves?" said Mrs. Haddo, who
was evidently softened by this reference to the past. "I remember
Beatrice Vivian," she continued, before the baronet had time to speak.
"She was a very charming girl, a little older than myself, and she was
undoubtedly a power for good in the school."

"Then, surely, that makes it quite all right?" said Sir John. "Mrs.
Haddo, you must pity me. I have to place these girls somewhere in a week
from now. I am responsible for them. They are homeless; they are young;
they are good-looking."

"Tell me something about their characters and dispositions," said Mrs.
Haddo.

"I can tell you nothing. I only saw Betty for two or three minutes; she
was in a state of wild, tempestuous grief, poor child! I tried to
comfort her, but she rushed away from me. Sylvia was nearly as bad;
while as to poor Hetty, she was ill with sorrow."

"Well, I will think the matter over and let you know," said Mrs. Haddo.
"I never decide anything hastily, so I cannot say more at present."

The baronet rose. "I had best have a peep at Fanny before I go," he
said. "I am only going as far as London to-night, so you can wire your
decision--'Yes' or 'No'--to the Ritz Hotel. Poor Fanny! she will be in
trouble when she hears that I cannot receive her at Christmas; but I
leave her in good hands here, and what can any one do more?"

"Please promise me one thing, Sir John," said Mrs. Haddo. "Do not say
anything to Fanny about the Vivians. Allow me to tell her when I have
decided that they are to come to the school. If I decide against it, she
need never know. Now, shall I ring and ask one of the servants to send
her to you? Believe me, Sir John, I will do my very utmost to oblige you
in this matter; but I must be guided by principle. You know what this
school means to me. You know how earnestly I have at heart the welfare
of all my children, as I call the girls who live at Haddo Court."

"Yes, yes, I know; but I think, somehow, that you will agree to my
request."

"Send Miss Crawford here," said Mrs. Haddo to a servant who appeared at
that moment, and a minute later Fanny entered the room. She gave a cry
of delight when she saw her father, and Mrs. Haddo at once left them
alone together.

The day was a half-holiday, and the head mistress was glad of the fact,
for she wanted to have a little time to think over Sir John's request.
Haddo Court had hitherto answered so admirably because no girl, even if
her name had been on the books for years, was admitted to the school
without the head mistress having a personal interview, first with her
parents or guardians, and afterwards with the girl herself. Many an
apparently charming girl was quietly but courteously informed that she
was not eligible for the vacancy which was to be filled, and Mrs. Haddo
was invariably right in her judgment. With her shrewd observation of
character, she saw something lacking in that pretty, or careless, or
even thoughtful, or sorrowful face--something which might _aspire_, but
could never by any possibility _attain_, to what the head mistress
desired to inculcate in the young lives around her--and now Mrs. Haddo
was asked to receive three girls under peculiar circumstances. They were
orphans and needed a home. Sir John Crawford was one of her oldest
friends. The Crawfords had always been associated with Haddo Court, and
beautiful Beatrice Vivian had received her education there. Surely there
could not be anything wrong in admitting three young girls like the
Vivians to the school? But yet there was her invariable rule. Could she
possibly see them? One short interview would decide her. She looked
round the beautiful home in which had grown up the fairest specimens of
English girlhood, and wondered if, for once, she might break her rule.

Sir John Crawford had gone to the Ritz Hotel. There he was to await Mrs.
Haddo's telegram. But she would not telegraph; she would go to London
herself. She took the first train from the nearest station, and arrived
unexpectedly at the "Ritz" just as Sir John was sitting down to dinner.

"I see by your face, my dear, good friend, that you are bringing me the
best of news!" said the eager man, flushing with pleasure as Mrs. Haddo
took a seat by his side. "You will join me at dinner, of course?"

"No, thank you, Sir John. I shall have supper at the Court on my return.
I will tell you at once what I have come about. I have, as you must know
well, never admitted a girl into my school without first seeing her and
judging for myself what her character was likely to be. I should
greatly like to help you in the present case, which is, I will admit, a
pressing one; and girls of the name of Vivian, and also related to you,
have claims undoubtedly on Haddo Court. Nevertheless, I am loath to
break my rule. Is it possible for me to see the girls?"

"I fear it is not," said Sir John. "I did not tell you that poor Frances
died in the north of Scotland, and I could not possibly get the girls up
to London in time for you to interview them and then decide against
them. It must be 'Yes' or 'No'--an immediate 'Yes' or 'No,' Mrs. Haddo;
for if you say 'No' and I pray God you won't--I must see what is the
next best thing I can do for them. Poor children! they are very lonely
and unhappy; but, of course, there _are_ other schools. Perhaps you
could recommend one, if you are determined to refuse them without an
interview?"

Mrs. Haddo could never tell afterwards why a sudden fit of weakness and
compassion overcame her. Perhaps it was the thought of the other
schools; for she was a difficult woman to please, and fastidious and
perhaps even a little scornful with regard to some of the teaching of
the present day. Perhaps it was the sight of Sir John's troubled face.
Perhaps it was the fact that there never was a nicer girl in the school
than Beatrice Vivian--Beatrice, who was long in her grave, but who had
been loved by every one in the house; Beatrice, whom Mrs. Haddo herself
remembered. It was the thought of Beatrice that finally decided the good
lady.

"It _is_ against my rule," she said, "and I hope I am not doing wrong. I
will take the children; but I make one condition, Sir John, that if I
find they do not fulfill the high expectations which are looked for in
every girl who comes to Haddo Court, I do my best to place them
elsewhere."

"You need not be afraid," said Sir John. His voice shook with delight
and gratitude. "You will never regret this generous act; and, believe
me, my dear friend, there is no rule, however firm, which is not
sometimes better broken than kept."

Alas, poor Sir John! he little knew what he was saying.




CHAPTER II

WAS FANNY ELATED?


Mrs. Haddo slept very little that night. Miss Symes, who adored the head
mistress, could not help noticing that something was the matter with
her; but she knew Mrs. Haddo's nature far too well to make any
inquiries. The next day, however, Miss Symes was called into the head
mistress's presence.

"I want to speak to you all alone," said Mrs. Haddo. "You realize, of
course, Emma, how fully I trust you?"

"You have always done so, dear Mrs. Haddo," replied the young teacher,
her beautiful face flushing with pleasure.

"Well, now, I am going to trust you more fully still. You noticed, or
perhaps you did not, that Sir John Crawford, Fanny's father, called to
see me yesterday?"

"Fanny herself told me," replied Miss Symes. "I found the poor, dear
child in floods of tears. Sir John Crawford is going to India
immediately, and Fanny says she is not likely to see him again for a
year."

"We will cheer her up all we can," said Mrs. Haddo. "I have many schemes
for next Christmas which will, I am sure, give pleasure to the girls who
are obliged to stay here. But time enough for all that later on. You
know, of course, Emma, that there are three vacancies in the upper
school?"

"Caused by the absence of the dear young Maitlands," replied Miss Symes.
"I cannot tell you how much we miss them."

"We do miss them," said Mrs. Haddo, who paused and looked attentively at
Miss Symes. "I don't suppose," she continued, "that there is any teacher
in the school who knows so much about the characters of the girls as you
do, my dear, good Emma."

"I think I know most of their characters," said Miss Symes; "characters
in the forming, as one must assuredly say, but forming well, dear Mrs.
Haddo. And who can wonder at that, under your influence?"

Mrs. Haddo's face expressed a passing anxiety.

"Is anything wrong?" said Miss Symes.

"Why do you ask me, Emma? Have you--noticed anything?"

"Yes, certainly. I have noticed that you are troubled, dear friend; and
Mary Arundel has also observed the same."

"But the girls--the girls have said nothing about it?" inquired Mrs.
Haddo.

"No; but young girls cannot see as far into character as older people
can."

"Well, now," said Mrs. Haddo, "I will be frank with you. What I say to
you, you can repeat to Mary Arundel. I feel proud to call you both my
flag lieutenants, who always hold the banner of high principle and
virtue aloft, and I feel certain you will do so to the end. Emma, Sir
John Crawford came to see me yesterday on a very important matter; and,
partly to oblige him, partly because of an old memory, partly also
because it seemed to me that I must trust and hope for the best in
certain emergencies, I have agreed to do what I never did
before--namely, to take three girls into the school--yes, into the upper
school, in place of the three Maitlands. These girls are called Betty,
Sylvia, and Hester Vivian. They are the nieces of that dear woman,
Beatrice Vivian, who was educated at this school years ago. I expect
them to arrive here on Monday next. In the meantime you must prepare the
other girls for their appearance on the scene. Do not blame me, Emma,
nor look on me with reproachful eyes. I quite understand what you are
thinking, that I have broken a rule which I have always declared I would
never break--namely, I am taking these girls without having first
interviewed them. Such is the case. Now, I want you, in particular, to
tell Fanny Crawford that they are coming. Fanny is their cousin. Sir
John is their guardian. Sir John knows nothing whatever about their
disposition, but I gather from some conversation which I had with him
last night that Fanny is acquainted with them. Observe, dear, how she
takes the news of their coming. If dear Fanny looks quite happy about
them, it will certainly be a rest to my mind."

"Oh, I will talk to her," said Miss Symes, rising. "And now, please,
dear Mrs. Haddo, don't be unhappy. You have done, in my opinion, the
only thing you could do; and girls with such high credentials must be
all right."

"I hope they will prove to be all that is desirable," said Mrs. Haddo.
"You had better have a talk with Miss Ludlow with regard to the rooms
they are to occupy. Poor children! they are in great trouble, having
already lost both their parents, and are now coming to me because their
aunt, Miss Vivian, has just died. It might comfort them to be in that
large room which is near Fanny's. It will hold three little beds and the
necessary furniture without any crowding."

"Yes, it would do splendidly," said Miss Symes. "I will speak to Miss
Ludlow. I suppose, now, I ought to return to my school duties?"

Miss Symes was not at all uneasy at what Mrs. Haddo had told her. Hers
was a gentle and triumphant sort of nature. She trusted most people. She
had a sublime faith in the good, not the bad, of her fellow-creatures.
Still, Mrs. Haddo had done a remarkable thing, and Miss Symes owned to
herself that she was a little curious to see how Fanny Crawford would
take the news of the unexpected advent of her relatives.

It was arranged that the Vivians were to arrive at Haddo Court on the
following Monday. To-day was Wednesday, and a half-holiday.
Half-holidays were always prized at Haddo Court; and the girls were now
in excellent spirits, full of all sorts of schemes and plans for the
term which had little more than begun, and during which they hoped to
achieve so much. Fanny Crawford, in particular, was in earnest
conversation with Susie Rushworth. They were forming a special plan for
strengthening what they called the bond of union in the upper school.
Fresh girls were to be admitted, and all kinds of schemes were in
progress. Susie had a wonderfully bright face, and her eager words fell
on Miss Symes's ears as she approached the two girls.

"It's all very fine for you, Susie," Fanny was heard to say; "but this
term seems to me quite intolerable. You will be going home for
Christmas, but I shall have to stay at the school. Oh, of course, I love
the school; but we are all proud of our holidays, and father had all but
promised to take me to Switzerland in order to get some really good
skating. Now everything is knocked on the head; but I suppose I must
submit."

"I couldn't help overhearing you, Fanny," said Miss Symes, coming up to
the girls at that moment; "but you must look on the bright side, my
love, and reflect that a year won't be long in going by. I know, of
course, to what you were alluding--your dear father's sudden departure
for India."

"Yes, St. Cecilia," replied Fanny, looking up into Miss Symes's face;
"and I am sure neither Susie nor I mind in the least your overhearing
what we were talking about. Do we Susie?"

"No," replied Susie; "how could we? St. Cecilia, if you think you have
been playing the spy, we will punish you by making you sing for us
to-night."

Here Susie linked her hand lovingly through Miss Symes's arm. Miss Symes
bent and kissed the girl's eager face.

"I will sing for you with pleasure, dear, if I have a moment of time to
spare. But now I have come to fetch Fanny. I want to have a little talk
with her all by herself. Fan, will you come with me?"

Fanny Crawford raised her pretty, dark eyebrows in some surprise. What
could this portend? There was a sort of code of honor at the school that
the girls were never to be disturbed by the teachers during the
half-holiday hours.

"Come, Fanny," said Miss Symes; and the two walked away in another
direction for some little distance.

The day was a glorious one towards the end of September. Miss Symes
chose an open bench in a part of the grounds where the forest land was
more or less cleared away. She invited Fanny to seat herself, and took a
place by her side.

"Now, my dear," she said, "I have a piece of news for you which will, I
think, please you very much."

"Oh, what can please me when father is going?" said Fanny, her eyes
filling with tears.

"Nevertheless, this may. You have, of course, heard of--indeed, I have
been given to understand that you know--your cousins, the Vivians?"

Fanny's face flushed. It became a vivid crimson, then the color faded
slowly from her cheeks; and she looked at Miss Symes, amazement in her
glance. "My cousins--the Vivians!" she exclaimed. "Do you mean
Betty--Betty and her sisters?"

"Yes, I think Betty is the name of one of the girls."

"There are three," said Fanny. "There's Betty, who is about my age; and
then there are the twins, Sylvia and Hetty."

"Then, of course, you _do_ know them, dear?"

"Yes, I know them. I went to stay with them in Scotland for a week
during last holidays. My cousin--their aunt, Miss Vivian--was very ill,
however, and we had to keep things rather quiet. They lived at a place
called Craigie Muir--quite beautiful, you know, but very, very wild."

"That doesn't matter, dear."

"Well, why are you speaking to me about them? They are my cousins, and I
spent a week with them not very long ago."

"You observed how ill Miss Vivian was?"

"I used to hear that she was ill; Sylvia used to tell me. Betty couldn't
stand anything sad or depressing, so I never spoke to her on the
subject."

"And you--you liked your cousins? You appreciated them, did you not,
Fanny?"

"I didn't know them very well," said Fanny in a slightly evasive voice.

Miss Symes felt her heart sink within her. She knew Fanny Crawford well.
She was the last girl to say a word against another; at the same time
she was exceedingly truthful.

"Well, dear," said Miss Symes, "your father came here yesterday in order
to----"

"To see me, of course," interrupted Fanny; "to tell me that he was going
to India. Poor darling dad! It was a terrible blow!"

"Sir John came here on other business also, Fanny. He wanted to see Mrs.
Haddo. You know that poor Miss Vivian is dead?"

"Oh, yes," said Fanny. Then she added impulsively, "Betty will be in a
terrible state!"

"It may be in your power to comfort her, dear."

"To comfort Betty Vivian! What do you mean?"

"It has just been arranged between Mrs. Haddo and your father, who is
now the guardian of the girls, that they are all three to come here as
pupils in the school. They will arrive here on Monday. You are glad, are
you not, Fan?"

Fanny started to her feet. She stood very still, staring straight before
her.

"You are glad--of course, Fanny?"

Fanny then turned and faced her governess. "Do you want the truth,
or--or--a lie?"

"Fanny, my dear, how can you speak to me in that tone? Of course I want
the truth."

"Then I am not glad."

"But, my dear, consider. Those poor girls--they are orphans almost in a
double sense. They are practically alone in the world. They are your
cousins. You must have a very strong reason for saying what you have
said--that you are not glad."

"I am not glad," repeated Fanny.

Miss Symes was silent. She felt greatly disturbed. After a minute she
said, "Fanny, is there anything in connection with the Vivians which, in
your opinion, Mrs. Haddo ought to know?"

"I won't tell," said Fanny; and now her voice was full of agitation. She
turned away and suddenly burst out crying.

"My dear child! my dear child! you are upset by the thought of your
father's absence. Compose yourself, my love. Don't give way, Fanny,
dear. Try to have that courage that we all strive to attain at Haddo
Court."

Fanny hastily dashed away her tears. Then she said, after a pause, "Is
it fixed that they are to come?"

"Yes, it is quite fixed."

"Miss Symes, you took me at first by surprise, but when the Vivians
arrive you will see that I shall treat them with the affection due to
cousins of my own; also, that I will do my utmost to make them happy."

"I am sure of it, my love. You are a very plucky girl!"

"And you won't tell Mrs. Haddo that I seemed distressed at the thought
of their coming?"

"Do you really wish me not to tell her?"

"I do, most earnestly."

"Now, Fanny, I am going to trust you. Mrs. Haddo has been more or less
driven into a corner over this matter. Your dear, kind father has been
suddenly left in sole charge of those three young girls. He could not
take them to India with him, and he had no home to offer them in this
country. Mrs. Haddo, therefore, contrary to her wont, has agreed to
receive them without the personal interview which she has hitherto
thought essential."

Fanny smiled. "Oh, can I ever forget that interview when my turn came to
receive it? I was at once more frightened and more elated than I
believed it possible for any girl to be. I loved Mrs. Haddo on the spot,
and yet I shook before her."

"But you don't fear her now, dear?"

"I should fear her most frightfully if I did anything wrong."

"Fanny, look down deep into your heart, and tell me if, in keeping
something to yourself which you evidently know concerning your cousins,
you are doing right or wrong."

"I will answer your question to-morrow," replied Fanny. "Now, may I go
back to the others; they are waiting for me?"

"Yes, you may go, dear."

"The Vivians come here on Monday?" said Fanny as she rose.

"Yes, dear, on Monday. By the way, Miss Ludlow is arranging to give them
the blue room, next to yours. You don't object, do you?"

"No," said Fanny. The next minute the girl was out of sight.

Miss Symes sat very still. What was the matter? What was Fanny Crawford
trying to conceal?

That evening Mrs. Haddo said to Miss Symes, "You have told Fanny that
her cousins are coming?"

"Yes."

"And how did she take it?"

"Fanny is very much upset about her father's absence," was Miss Symes's
unexpected answer.

Mrs. Haddo looked attentively at the English teacher. Their eyes met,
but neither uttered a single word.

The next day, after school, Fanny went up to Miss Symes. "I have been
thinking over everything," she said, "and my conscience is not going to
trouble me; for I know, or believe I know, a way by which I may help
them all."

"It is a grand thing to help those who are in sorrow, Fanny."

"I will do my best," said the girl.

That evening, to Miss Symes's great relief, she heard Fanny's merry
laugh in the school. The girls who formed the Specialities, as they were
called, had met for a cheerful conference. Mary and Julia Bertram were
in the highest spirits; and Margaret Grant, with her beautiful
complexion and stately ways, had never been more agreeable. Olive
Repton, the pet and darling of nearly the whole of the upper school, was
making the others scream with laughter.

"There can be nothing very bad," thought Miss Symes to herself. "My dear
friend will soon see that the charitable feeling which prompted her to
receive those girls into the house was really but another sign of her
true nobility of character."

Meanwhile Fanny, who was told not to keep the coming of the Vivians in
any way a secret, was being eagerly questioned with regard to them.

"So you really saw them at their funny home, Craigie Muir?" exclaimed
Olive.

"Yes; I spent a week there," said Fanny.

"And had a jolly good time, I guess?" cried Julia Bertram.

"Not such a very good time," answered Fanny, "for Miss Vivian was ill,
and we had to be very quiet."

"Oh! don't let's bother about the time Fanny spent in that remote part
of Scotland," said Olive. "Do tell us about the girls themselves, Fan.
It's so unusual for any girls to come straight into the upper school,
and also to put in an appearance in the middle of term. Are they very
Scotch, to begin with?"

"No, hardly at all," replied Fanny. "Miss Vivian only took the pretty
little cottage in which they live a year ago."

"I am glad they are not too Scotch," remarked Susie; "they will get into
our ways all the sooner if they are thoroughly English."

"I don't see that for a single moment," remarked Olive. "For my part, I
love Scotch lassies; and as to Irish colleens, they're simply adorable."

"Well, well, go on with your description, Fan," exclaimed Julia.

"I can tell you they are quite remarkable-looking," replied Fanny.
"Betty is the eldest. She is a regular true sort of Betty, up to no end
of larks and fun; but sometimes she gets very depressed. I think she is
rather dark, but I am not quite sure; she is also somewhat tall; and,
oh, she is wonderfully pretty! She can whistle the note of every bird
that ever sang, and is devoted to wild creatures--the moor ponies and
great Scotch collies and sheep-dogs. You'll be sure to like Betty
Vivian."

"Your description does sound promising," remarked Susie; "but she will
certainly have to give up her wild ways at Haddo Court."

"What about the others?" asked Olive.

"Sylvia and Hetty? I think they are two years younger than Betty. They
are not a bit like her. They are rather heavy-looking girls, but still
you would call them handsome. They are twins, and wonderfully like each
other. Sylvia is very tender-hearted; but Hetty--I think Hetty has the
most force of character. Now, really," continued Fanny, rising from her
low chair, where her chosen friends were surrounding her, "I can say
nothing more about them until they come. You can't expect me, any of
you, to overpraise my own relations, and, naturally, I shouldn't abuse
them."

"Why, of course not, you dear old Fan!" exclaimed Olive.

"I must go and write a letter to father," said Fanny; and she went
across the room to where her own little desk stood in a distant corner.

After she had left them, Olive bent forward, looked with her merry,
twinkling eyes full into Susie Rushworth's face, and said, "Is the dear
Fan _altogether_ elated at the thought of her cousins' arrival? I put it
to you, Susie, as the most observant of us all. Answer me truthfully, or
for ever hold your peace."

"Then I will hold my peace," replied Susie, "for I cannot possibly say
whether Fan is elated or not."

"Now, don't get notions in your head, Olive," said Mary Bertram. "That
is one of your faults, you know. I expect those girls will be downright
jolly; and, of course, being Fan's relations, they will become members
of the Specialities. That goes without saying."

"It doesn't go without saying at all," remarked Olive. "The
Specialities, as you know quite well, girls, have to stand certain
tests."

"It is my opinion," said Susie, "that we are all getting too high and
mighty for anything. Perhaps the Vivians will teach us to know our own
places."




CHAPTER III

GOING SOUTH


It was a rough stone house, quite bare, only one story high, and without
a tree growing anywhere near it. It stood on the edge of a vast Scotch
moor, and looked over acres and acres of purple heather--acres so
extensive that the whole country seemed at that time of year to be
covered with a sort of mantle of pinky, pearly gold, something between
the violet and the saffron tones of a summer sunset.

Three girls were seated on a little stone bench outside the lonely,
neglected-looking house. They were roughly and plainly dressed. They
wore frocks of the coarsest Scotch tweed; and Scotch tweed, when it is
black, can look very coarse, indeed. They clung close together--a
desolate-looking group--Betty, the eldest, in the middle; Sylvia
pressing up to her at one side; Hetty, with her small, cold hand locked
in her sister's, on the other.

"I wonder when Uncle John will come," was Hetty's remark after a pause.
"Jean says we are on no account to travel alone; so, if he doesn't come
to-night, we mayn't ever reach that fine school after all."

"I am not going to tell him about the packet. I have quite made up my
mind on that point," said Betty, dropping her voice.

"Oh, Bet!" The other two looked up at their elder sister.

She turned and fixed her dark-gray eyes first on one face, then on the
other. "Yes," she said, nodding emphatically; "the packet is sure to
hold money, and it will be a safe-guard. If we find the school
intolerable we'll have the wherewithal to run away."

"I've read in books that school life is very jolly sometimes," remarked
Sylvia.

"Not _that_ school," was Betty's rejoinder.

"But why not that school, Betty?"

Betty shrugged her shoulders. "Haven't you heard that miserable
creature, Fanny Crawford, talk of it? I shouldn't greatly mind going
anywhere else, for if there's a human being whom I cordially detest, it
is my cousin, Fanny Crawford."

"I hear the sound of wheels!" cried Sylvia, springing to her feet.

"Ah, and there's Donald coming back," said Betty; "and there is Uncle
John! No chance of escape, girls! We have got to go through it. Poor old
David!"--here she alluded to the horse who was tugging a roughly made
dogcart up the very steep hill--"he'll miss us, perhaps; and so will
Fritz and Andrew, the sheep-dogs. Heigh-ho! there's no good being too
sorrowful. That money is a rare comfort!"

By this time the old white horse, and Donald, who was driving, and the
gentleman who sat at the opposite side of the dogcart, drew up at the
top of the great plateau. The gentleman alighted and walked swiftly
towards the three girls. They rose simultaneously to meet him.

In London, and in any other part of the south of England, the weather
was warm at this time of the year; but up on Craigie Muir it was cold,
and the children looked desolate as they turned in their coarse clothes
to meet their guardian.

Sir John came up to them with a smile. "Now, my dears, here I am--Betty,
how do you do? Kiss your uncle, child."

Betty raised her pretty lips and gave the weather-beaten cheek of Sir
John Crawford an unwilling kiss. Sylvia and Hetty clasped each other's
hands, clung a little more closely together, and remained mute.

"Come, come," said Sir John; "we mustn't be miserable, you know! I hope
that good Jean has got you something for supper, for the air up here
would make any one hungry. Shall we go into the house? We all have to
start at cockcrow in the morning. Donald knows, and has arranged, he
tells me, for a cart to hold your luggage. Let's come in, children. I
really should be glad to get out of this bitter blast."

"It is just lovely!" said Betty. "I am drinking it in all I can, for I
sha'n't have any more for many a long day."

Sir John, who had the kindest face in the world, accompanied by the
kindest heart, looked anxiously at the handsome girl. Then he thought
what a splendid chance he was giving his young cousins; for, although he
allowed them to call him uncle, the relationship between them was not
quite so close.

They all entered the sparsely furnished and bare-looking house. Six deal
boxes, firmly corded with great strands of rope, were piled one on top
of the other in the narrow hall.

"Here's our luggage," said Betty.

"My dear children--those deal boxes! What possessed you to put your
things into trunks of that sort?"

"They are the only trunks we have," replied Betty. "And I think supper
is ready," she continued; "I smell the grouse. I told Jean to have
plenty ready for supper."

"Good girl, good girl!" said Sir John. "Now I will go upstairs and wash
my hands; and I presume you will do the same, little women. Then we'll
all enjoy a good meal."

A few minutes later Sir John Crawford and the three Misses Vivian were
seated round a rough table, on which was spread a very snowy but coarse
cloth. The grouse were done to a turn. There was excellent coffee, the
best scones in the world, and piles of fresh butter. In addition, there
was a small bottle of very choice Scotch whiskey placed on the
sideboard, with lemons and other preparations for a comforting drink by
and by for Sir John.

The girls were somewhat silent during the meal. Even Betty, who could be
a chatterbox when she pleased, vouchsafed but few remarks.

But when the supper-things had been cleared away Sir John said
emphatically, turning to the three girls, "You got my telegram, with its
splendid news?"

"We got your telegram, Uncle John," said Hetty.

"With its splendid news?" repeated Sir John.

Hetty pursed up her firm lips; Sylvia looked at him and smiled; Betty
crossed the room and put a little black kettle on the peat fire to boil.

"You would like some whisky-punch?" Betty said. "I know how to make it."

"Thank you, my dear; I should very much. And do you three lassies object
to a pipe?"

"Object!" said Betty. "No; Donald smokes every night; and
since--since----" Her voice faltered; her face grew pale. After a
minute's silence she said in an abrupt tone, "We go into the kitchen
most nights to talk to Donald while he smokes."

"Then to-night you must talk to me. I can tell you, my dears, you are
the luckiest young girls in the whole of Great Britain to have got
admitted to Haddo Court; and my child Fan will look after you. You
understand, dears, that everything you want you apply to me for. I am
your guardian, appointed to that position by your dear aunt. You can
write to me yourselves, or ask Fan to do so. By the way, I have been
looking through some papers in a desk which belonged to your dear aunt,
and cannot find a little sealed packet which she left there. Do you know
anything about it, any of you?"

"No, uncle, nothing," said Betty, raising her dark-gray eyes and fixing
them full on his face.

"Well, I suppose it doesn't matter," said Sir John; "but in a special
letter to me she mentioned the packet. I suppose, however, it will turn
up. Now, my dears, you are in luck. When you get over your very natural
grief----"

"Oh, don't!" said Betty. "Get over it? We'll never get over it!"

"My dear, dear child, time softens all troubles. If it did not we
couldn't live. I admire you, Betty, for showing love for one so
worthy----"

"If you don't look out, Uncle John," suddenly exclaimed Hetty, "you'll
have Betty howling; and when she begins that sort of thing we can't stop
her for hours."

Sir John raised his brows and looked in a puzzled way from one girl to
the other. "You will be very happy at Haddo Court," he said; "and you
are in luck to get there. Now, off to bed, all three of you, for we have
to make an early start in the morning." Sir John held out his hand as he
spoke. "Kiss me, Betty," he said to the eldest girl.

"Are you my uncle?" she inquired.

"No; your father and I were first cousins. But, my poor child, I stand
in the place of father and guardian to you now."

"I'd rather not kiss you, if you don't mind," said Betty.

"You must please yourself. Now go to bed, all of you."

The girls left the little sitting-room. It was their fashion to hold
each other's hands, and in a chain of three they now entered the
kitchen.

"Jean," said Betty, "_he_ says we are to go to bed. I want to ask you
and Donald a question, and I want to ask it quickly."

"And what is the question, my puir bit lassie?" asked Jean Macfarlane.

"It is this," said Betty--"you and Donald can answer it quickly--if we
want to come back here you will take us in, won't you?"

"Take you in, my bonny dears! Need you ask? There's a shelter always for
the bit lassies under this roof," said Donald Macfarlane.

"Thanks, Donald," said Betty. "And thank you, Jean," she added. "Come,
girls, let's go to bed."

The girls went up to the small room in the roof which they occupied.
They slept in three tiny beds side by side. The beds were under the
sloping roof, and the air of the room was cold. But Betty, Sylvia, and
Hetty were accustomed to cold, and did not mind it. The three little
beds touched each other, and the three girls quickly undressed and got
between the coarse sheets. Betty, as the privileged one, was in the
middle. And now a cold little hand was stretched out from the left bed
towards her, and a cold little hand from the right bed did ditto.

"Betty," said Sylvia in a choking voice, "you will keep us up? You are
the brave one."

"Except when I cry," said Betty.

"Oh, but, Betty," said Hetty, "you will promise not to! It's awful when
you do! You will promise, won't you?"

"I will try my best," said Betty.

"How long do you think, Betty, that you and Hetty and I will be able to
endure that awful school?" said Sylvia.

"It all depends," said Betty. "But we've got the money to get away with
when we like. It was left for our use. Now, look, here, girls. I am
going to tell you a tremendous secret."

"Oh, yes! oh, yes!" exclaimed the other two. "Betty, you're a perfect
darling; you are the most heroic creature in the world!"

"Listen; and don't talk, girls. I told a lie to-night about that packet;
but no one else will know about it. There was one day--now don't
interrupt me, either of you, or I'll begin howling, and then I can't
stop--there was one day when Auntie Frances was very ill. She sent for
me, and I went to her; and she said, 'I am able to leave you so very
little, my children; but there is a nest-egg in a little packet in the
right-hand drawer of my bureau. You must always keep it--always until
you really want it.' I felt so bursting all round my heart, and so choky
in my throat, that I thought I'd scream there and then; but I kept all
my feelings in, and went away, and pretended to dearest auntie that I
didn't feel it a bit. Then, you know, she, she--died."

"She was very cold," said Sylvia. "I saw her--I seem to see her still.
Her face made me shiver."

"Don't!" said Betty in a fierce voice. "Do you want me to howl all night
long?"

"I won't! I won't!" said Sylvia. "Go on, Betty darling--heroine that you
are!"

"Well, I went to her bureau straight away, and I took the packet. As a
matter of fact, I already knew quite well that it was there; for I had
often opened auntie's bureau and looked at her treasures, so I could lay
my hands on it at once. I never mean to part with the packet. It's
heavy, so it's sure to be full of gold--plenty of gold for us to live on
if we don't like that beastly school. When Sir John--or Uncle John, as
he wants us to call him----"

"He's no uncle of mine," said Hetty.

"I like him, for my part," said Sylvia.

"Don't interrupt me," said Betty. "When Uncle John asked me about the
packet I said 'No,' of course; and I mean to say 'No' again, and again,
and again, and again, if ever I'm questioned about it. For didn't auntie
say it was for us? And what right has he to interfere?"

"It does sound awfully interesting!" exclaimed Sylvia. "I do hope you've
put it in a very, very safe place, Betty?"

Betty laughed softly. "Do you remember the little, old-fashioned pockets
auntie always wore inside her dress--little, flat pockets made of very
strong calico? Well, it's in one of those; and I mean to secure a safer
hiding-place for it when I get to that abominable Court. Now perhaps
we'd better go to sleep."

"Yes; I am dead-sleepy," responded Sylvia.

By and by her gentle breathing showed that she was in the land of
slumber. Hetty quickly followed her twin-sister's example. But Betty lay
wide awake. She was lying flat on her back, and looking out into the
sort of twilight which still seemed to pervade the great moors. Her eyes
were wide open, and wore a startled, fixed expression, like the eyes of
a girl who was seeing far beyond what she appeared to be looking at.

"Yes, I have done right," she said to herself. "There must always be an
open door, and this is my open door; and I hope God, and auntie up in
heaven, will forgive me for having told that lie. And I hope God, and
auntie up in heaven, will forgive me if I tell it again; for I mean to
go on telling it, and telling it, and telling it, until I have spent all
that money."

While Betty lay thinking her wild thoughts, Sir John Crawford,
downstairs, made a shrewd and careful examination of the different
articles of furniture which had been left in the little stone house by
his old friend, Miss Frances Vivian. Everything was in perfect order.
She was a lady who abhorred disorder, who could not endure it for a
single moment. All her letters and her neatly receipted bills were tied
up with blue silk, and laid, according to date, one on top of the other.
Her several little trinkets, which eventually would belong to the girls,
were in their places. Her last will and testament was also in the drawer
where she had told Sir John he would find it. Everything was in
order--everything, exactly as the poor lady had left it, with the
exception of the little sealed packet. Where was it? Sir John felt
puzzled and distressed. He had not an idea what it contained; for Miss
Vivian, in her letter to him, had simply asked him to take care of it
for her nieces, and had not made any comment with regard to its
contents. Sir John certainly could not accuse the girls of purloining
it. After some pain and deliberate thought, he decided to go out and
speak to the old servants, who were still up, in the kitchen. They
received him respectfully, and yet with a sort of sour expression which
was natural to their homely Scotch faces.

Donald rose silently, and asked the gentleman if he would seat himself.

"No, Donald," replied Sir John in his hearty, pleasant voice; "I cannot
stay. I am going to bed, being somewhat tired."

"The bit chamber is no' too comfortable for your lordship," said Jean,
dropping a profound curtsey.

"The chamber will do all right. I have slept in it before," said Sir
John.

"Eh, dear, now," said Jean, "and you be easy to please."

"I want you, Jean Macfarlane, to call the young ladies and myself not
later than five o'clock to-morrow morning, and to have breakfast ready
at half-past five; and, Donald, we shall require the dogcart to drive to
the station at six o'clock. Have you given orders about the young
ladies' luggage? It ought to start not later than four to-morrow morning
to be in time to catch the train."

"Eh, to be sure," said Donald. "It's myself has seen to all that. Don't
you fash yourself, laird. Things'll be in time. All me and my wife wants
is that the bit lassies should have every comfort."

"I will see to that," said Sir John.

"We'll miss them, puir wee things!" exclaimed Jean; and there came a
glint of something like tears into her hard and yet bright blue eyes.

"I am sure you will. You have, both of you, been valued servants both to
my cousin and her nieces. I wish to make you a little present each."
Here Sir John fumbled in his pocket, and took out a couple of
sovereigns.

But the old pair drew back in some indignation. "Na, na!" they
exclaimed; "it isn't our love for them or for her as can be purchased
for gowd."

"Well, as you please, my good people. I respect you all the more for
refusing. But now, may I ask you a question?"

"And whatever may that be?" exclaimed Jean.

"I have looked through your late mistress's effects----"

"And whatever may 'effects' be?" inquired Donald.

"What she has left behind her."

"Ay, the laird uses grand words," remarked Donald, turning to his wife.

"Maybe," said Jean; "but its the flavor of the Scotch in the speech that
softens my heart the most."

"Well," said Sir John quickly, "there's one little packet I cannot find.
Miss Vivian wrote to me about it in a letter which I received after her
death. I haven't an idea what it contained; but she seemed to set some
store by it, and it was eventually to be the property of the young
ladies."

"Puir lambs! Puir lambs!" said Jean.

"I have questioned them about it, but they know nothing."

"And how should they, babes as they be?" said Jean.

"You'll not be offended, Jean Macfarlane and Donald Macfarlane, if I ask
you the same question?"

Jean flushed an angry red for a moment; but Donald's shrewd face
puckered up in a smile.

"You may ask, and hearty welcome," he said; "but I know no more aboot
the bit packet than the lassies do, and that's naucht at all."

"Nor me no more than he," echoed Jean.

"Do you think, by any possibility, any one from outside got into the
house and stole the little packet?"

"Do I think!" exclaimed Jean. "Let me tell you, laird, that a man or
woman as got in here unbeknownst to Donald and me would go out again
pretty quick with a flea in the ear."

Sir John smiled. "I believe you," he said. He went upstairs, feeling
puzzled. But when he laid his head on his pillow he was so tired that he
fell sound asleep. The sleep seemed to last but for a minute or two when
Jean's harsh voice was heard telling him to rise, for it was five
o'clock in the morning. Then there came a time of bustle and confusion.
The girls, with their faces white as sheets, came down to breakfast in
their usual fashion--hand linked within hand. Sir John thought, as he
glanced at them, that he had never seen a more desolate-looking little
trio. They hardly ate any of the excellent food which Jean had provided.
The good baronet guessed that their hearts were full, and did not worry
them with questions.

The pile of deal boxes had disappeared from the narrow hall and was
already on its way to Dunstan Station, where they were to meet a local
train which would presently enable them to join the express for London.
There was a bewildered moment of great anguish when Jean caught the
lassies to her breast, when the dogs clustered round to be embraced and
hugged and patted. Then Donald, leading the horse (for there was no room
for him to ride in the crowded dogcart), started briskly on the road to
Dunstan, and Craigie Muir was left far behind.

By and by they all reached the railway station. The luggage was piled up
on the platform. Sir John took first-class tickets to London, and the
curious deal boxes found their place in the luggage van. Donald's
grizzly head and rugged face were seen for one minute as the train
steamed out of the station. Betty clutched at the side of her dress
where Aunt Frances' old flat pocket which contained the packet was
secured. The other two girls looked at her with a curious mingling of
awe and admiration, and then they were off.

Sir John guessed at the young people's feelings, and did not trouble
them with conversation. By and by they left the small train and got into
a compartment reserved for them in the London express. Sir John did
everything he could to enliven the journey for his young cousins. But
they were taciturn and irresponsive. Betty's wonderful gray eyes looked
out of the window at the passing landscape, which Sir John was quite
sure she did not see; Sylvia and Hester were absorbed in watching their
sister. Sir John had a queer kind of feeling that there was something
wrong with the girls' dress; that very coarse black serge, made with no
attempt at style; the coarse, home-made stockings; the rough, hobnailed
boots; the small tam-o'-shanter caps, pushed far back from the little
faces; the uncouth worsted gloves; and then the deal boxes! He had a
kind of notion that things were very wrong, and that the girls did not
look a bit at his own darling Fanny looked, nor in the least like the
other girls he had seen at Haddo Court. But Sir John Crawford had been a
widower for years, and during that time had seen little of women. He had
not the least idea how to remedy what looked a little out of place even
at Craigie Muir, but now that they were flying south looked much worse.
Could he possibly spare the time to spend a day in a London hotel, and
buy the girls proper toilets, and have their clothes put into regulation
trunks? But no, in the first place, he had not the time; in the second,
he would not have the slightest idea what to order.

They all arrived in London late in the evening. Sylvia and Hetty had
been asleep during the latter part of the journey, but Betty still sat
bolt upright and wide awake. It was dusk now, and the lamp in the
carriage was lit. It seemed to throw a shadow on the girl's miserable
face. She was very young--only the same age as Sir John's dear Fanny;
and yet how different, how pale, how full of inexpressible sadness was
that little face! Those gray eyes of hers seemed to haunt him! He was
the kindest man on earth, and would have given worlds to comfort her;
but he did not know what to do.




CHAPTER IV

RECEPTION AT HADDO COURT


Having made up her mind to receive the Vivian girls, Mrs. Haddo arranged
matters quite calmly and to her entire satisfaction. There was no fuss
or commotion of any kind; and when Sir John appeared on the following
morning, with the six deal boxes and the three girls dressed in their
coarse Highland garments, they were all received immediately in Mrs.
Haddo's private sitting-room.

"I have brought the girls, Mrs. Haddo," said Sir John. "This is Betty.
Come forward, my dear, and shake hands with your new mistress."

"How old are you?" asked Mrs. Haddo.

"I was sixteen my last birthday, and that was six months ago, and one
fortnight and three days," replied Betty in a very distinct voice,
holding herself bolt upright, and looking with those strange eyes full
into Mrs. Haddo's face. She spoke with extreme defiance. But she
suddenly met a rebuff--a kind of rebuff that she did not expect; for
Mrs. Haddo's eyes looked back at her with such a world of love,
sympathy, and understanding that the girl felt that choking in her
throat and that bursting sensation in her heart which she dreaded more
than anything else. She instantly lowered her brilliant eyes and stood
back, waiting for her sisters to speak.

Sylvia came up a little pertly. "Hetty and I are twins," she said, "and
we'll be fifteen our next birthday; but that's not for a long time yet."

"Well, my dears, I am glad to welcome you all three, and I hope you will
have a happy time in my school. I will not trouble you with rules or
anything irksome of that sort to-day. You will like to see your cousin,
Fanny Crawford. She is busy at lessons now; so I would first of all
suggest that you go to your room, and change your dress, and get tidy
after your journey. You have come here nice and early; and in honor of
your arrival I will give, what is my invariable custom, a half-holiday
to the upper school, so that you may get to know your companions."

"Ask Miss Symes to be good enough to come here," said Betty, but Betty
would not raise her eyes. She was standing very still, her hands locked
tightly together. Mrs. Haddo walked to the bell and rang it. A servant
appeared.

"Ask Miss Symes to be good enough to come here," said Mrs. Haddo.

The English governess with the charming, noble face presently appeared.

"Miss Symes," said Mrs. Haddo, "may I introduce you to Sir John
Crawford?"

Sir John bowed, and the governess bent her head gracefully.

"And these are your new pupils, the Vivians. This is Betty, and this
little girl is Sylvia. Am I not right, dear?"

"No; I am Hester," said the girl addressed as Sylvia.

"This is Hetty, then; and this is Sylvia. Will you take them to their
room and do what you can for their comfort? If they like to stay there
for a little they can do so. I will speak to you presently, if you will
come to me here."

The girls and Miss Symes left the presence of the head mistress. The
moment they had done so Mrs. Haddo gave a quick sigh. "My dear Sir
John," she said, "what remarkable, and interesting, and difficult, and
almost impossible girls you have intrusted to my care!"

"I own they are not like others," said Sir John; "but you have admitted
they are interesting."

"Yes," said Mrs. Haddo, speaking slowly. "I shall manage them yet. The
eldest girl, Betty, is wonderful. What a heart! what a soul! but, oh,
very hard to get at!"

"I thought, perhaps," said Sir John, fidgeting slightly, "that you would
object to the rough way they are clothed. I really don't like it myself;
at least, I don't think it's quite the fashion."

"Their clothes do not matter at all, Sir John."

"But the less remarkable they look the better they will get on in the
school," persisted Sir John; "so, of course, you will get what is
necessary."

"Naturally, Miss Symes and I will see to that."

"They led a very rough life in the country," continued Sir John, "and
yet it was a pure and healthy life--out all day long on those great
moors, and with no one to keep them company except a faithful old
servant of Miss Vivian's and his wife. They made pets of dogs and
horses, and were happy after their fashion. You will do what you can for
them, will you not, Mrs. Haddo?"

"Having accepted them into my school, I will do my utmost. I do not mind
simple manners, for the noblest natures are to be found among such
people; nor do I mind rough, ungainly clothing, for that, indeed, only
belongs to the outward girl and can quickly be remedied. I will keep
these girls, and do all that woman can for them, provided I see no
deceit in any of them; but that, you will clearly understand, Sir John,
is in my opinion an unpardonable sin."

"Do they look like girls who would deceive any one?" was Sir John's
rejoinder.

"I grant you they do not. Now, you must be very busy, so you must cast
the girls from your mind. You would like to see Fanny. I know she is
dying to have a talk with you."

Meanwhile Miss Symes had conducted the girls upstairs. The room they
entered was much grander than any room they had ever seen before. It was
large--one of the largest bedrooms in the great house. It had three
noble windows which reached from floor to ceiling, and were of French
style, so that they could be opened wide in summer weather to admit the
soft, warm air. There was a great balcony outside the windows, where the
girls could sit when they chose. The room itself was called the blue
room; the reason of this was that the color on the walls was pale blue,
whereas the paint was white. The three little beds stood in a row, side
by side. There was a very large wardrobe exactly facing the beds, also a
chest of large drawers for each girl, while the carpet was blue to match
the walls. A bright fire was burning in the cheerful, new-fashioned
grate. Altogether, it would have been difficult to find a more charming
apartment than the blue room at Haddo Court.

"Are we to sleep here?" asked Betty.

"Yes, my dear child. These are your little beds; and Anderson, the
schoolroom maid, will unpack your trunks presently. I see they have been
brought up."

Miss Symes slightly started, for the six wooden trunks, fastened by
their coarse ropes, were standing side by side in another part of the
room.

"Why do you look at our trunks like that?" asked Sylvia, who was not
specially shy, and was quick to express her feelings.

But Betty came to the rescue. "Never mind how she looks," remarked
Betty; "she can look as she likes. What does it matter to us?"

This speech was so very different from the ordinary speech of the
ordinary girl who came to Haddo Court that Miss Symes was nonplussed for
a moment. She quickly, however, recovered her equanimity.

"Now, my dears, you must make yourselves quite at home. You must not be
shy, or lonely, or unhappy. You must enter--which I hope you will do
very quick--into the life of this most delightful house. We are all
willing and anxious to make you happy. As to your trunks, they will be
unpacked and put away in one of the attics."

"I wish we could sleep in an attic," said Betty then in a fierce voice.
"I hate company-rooms."

"There is no attic available, my dear; and this, you must admit, is a
nice room."

"I admit nothing," said Betty.

"I think it's a nice room," said Hester; "only, of course, we are not
accustomed to it, and that great fire is so chokingly hot. May we open
all the windows?"

"Certainly, dears, provided you don't catch cold."

"Catch cold!" said Sylvia in a voice of scorn. "If you had ever lived
on a Scotch moor you wouldn't talk of catching cold in a stuffy little
hole of a place like this."

Miss Symes had an excellent temper, but she found it a trifle difficult
to keep it under control at that moment. "I must ask you for the keys of
your trunks," she said; "for while we are at dinner, which will be in
about an hour's time, Anderson will unpack them."

"Thanks," said Betty, "but we'd much rather unpack our own trunks."

Miss Symes was silent for a minute. "In this house, dear, it is not the
custom," she said then. She spoke very gently. She was puzzled at the
general appearance, speech, and get-up of the new girls.

"And we can, of course, keep our own keys," continued Betty, speaking
rapidly, her very pale face glowing with a faint tinge of color;
"because Mrs.----What is the name of the mistress?"

"Mrs. Haddo," said Miss Symes in a tone of great respect.

"Well, whatever her name is, she said we were to be restricted by no
rules to-day. She said so, didn't she, Sylvia? Didn't she, Hetty?"

"She certainly did," replied the twins.

"Then, if it's a rule for the trunks to be unpacked by some one else, it
doesn't apply to us to-day," said Betty. "If you will be so very kind,
Miss----"

"Symes is my name."

"So very kind, Miss Symes, as to go away and leave us, we'll begin to
unpack our own trunks and put everything away by dinner-time."

"Very well," said Miss Symes quite meekly. "Is there anything else I can
do for your comfort?"

"Yes," remarked Sylvia in a pert tone; "you can go away."

Miss Symes left the room. When she did so the two younger girls looked
at their elder sister. Betty's face was very white, and her chest was
working ominously.

Sylvia went up to her and gave her a sudden, violent slap between the
shoulders. "Now, don't begin!" she said. "If you do, they'll all come
round us. It isn't as if we could rush away to the middle of the moors,
and you could go on with it as long as you liked. Here, if you howl,
you'll catch it; for they'll stand over you, and perhaps fling water on
your head."

"Leave me alone, then, for a minute," said Betty. She flung herself flat
on the ground, face downwards, her hair falling about her shoulders. She
lay as still as though she were carved in stone. The twin girls watched
her for a minute. Then very softly and carefully Sylvia approached the
prone figure, pushed her hand into Betty's pocket (a very coarse,
ordinary pocket it was, put in at the side of her dress by Jean's own
fingers), and took out a bunch of keys.

Sylvia held up the keys with a glad smile. "Now let's begin," she said.
"It's an odious, grandified room, and Betty'll go mad here; but we can't
help it--at least, for a bit. And there's always the packet."

At these words, to the great relief of her younger sisters, Betty stood
upright. "There's always the packet," she said. "Now let's begin to
unpack."

Notwithstanding the fact that there were six deal trunks--six trunks of
the plainest make, corded with the coarsest rope--there was very little
inside them, at least as far as an ordinary girl's wardrobe is
concerned; for Miss Frances Vivian had been very poor, and during the
last year of her life had lived at Craigie Muir in the strictest
economy. She was, moreover, too ill to be greatly troubled about the
girls' clothing; and by and by, as her illness progressed, she left the
matter altogether to Jean. Jean was to supply what garments the young
ladies required, and Jean set about the work with a right good will. So
the coarsest petticoats, the most clumsy stockings, the ugliest jackets
and blouses and skirts imaginable, presently appeared out of the little
wooden trunks.

The girls sorted them eagerly, putting them pell-mell into the drawers
without the slightest attempt at any sort of order. But if there were
very few clothes in the trunks, there were all sorts of other things.
There were boxes full of caterpillars in different stages of chrysalis
form. There was also a glass box which contained an enormous spider.
This was Sylvia's special property. She called the spider Dickie, and
adored it. She would not give it flies, which she considered cruel, but
used to keep it alive on morsels of raw meat. Every day, for a quarter
of an hour, Dickie was allowed to take exercise on a flat stone on the
edge of the moor. It was quite against even Jean Macfarlane's advice
that Dickie was brought to the neighborhood of London. But he was here.
He had borne his journey apparently well, and Sylvia looked at him now
with worshiping eyes.

In addition to the live stock, which was extensive and varied, there
were also all kinds of strange fossils, and long, trailing pieces of
heather--mementos of the life which the girls lived on the moor, and
which they had left with such pain and sorrow. They were all busy
worshiping Dickie, and envying Sylvia's bravery in bringing the huge
spider to Haddo Court, when there came a gentle tap at the door.

Betty said crossly, "Who's there?"

A very refined voice answered, "It's I;" and the next minute Fanny
Crawford entered the room. "How are you all?" she said. Her eyes were
red, for she had just said good-bye to her father, and she thoroughly
hated the idea of the girls coming to the school.

"How are you, Fan?" replied Betty, speaking in a careless tone, just
nodding her head, and looking again into the glass box. "He is very
hungry," she continued. "By the way, Fan, will you run down to the
kitchen and get a little bit of raw meat?"

"Will I do what?" asked Fanny.

"Well, I suppose there is a kitchen in the house, and you can get a bit
of raw meat. It's for Dickie."

"Oh," said Fanny, coming forward on tiptoe and peeping into the box,
"you can't keep that terror here--you simply won't be allowed to have
it! Have you _no_ idea what school-life is like?"

"No," said Betty; "and what is more, I don't want you to tell me. Dickie
darling, I'd let you pinch my finger if it would do you any good.
Sylvia, what use are you if you can't feed your own spider? If Fan won't
oblige her cousins when she knows the ways of the house, I presume you
have a pair of legs and can use them? Go to the kitchen at once and get
a piece of raw meat."

"I don't know where it is," said Sylvia, looking slightly frightened.

"Well, you can ask. Go on; ask until you find. Now, be off with you!"

"You had better not," said Fanny. "Why, you will meet all the girls
coming out of the different classrooms!"

"What do girls matter," said Betty in a withering voice, "when Dickie is
hungry?"

Sylvia gathered up her courage and departed. Betty laid the glass box
which contained the spider on the dressing-table.

If Fanny had not been slightly afraid of these bold northern cousins of
hers, she would have dashed the box out on the balcony and released poor
Dickie, giving him back to his natural mode of life. "What queer dresses
you are wearing!" she said. "Do, please, change them before lunch. You
were not dressed like this when I saw you last. You were never
fashionable, but this stuff----"

"You'd best not begin, Fan, or I'll howl," said Betty.

"Hush! do hush, Fanny!" exclaimed Hester. "Don't forget that we are in
mourning for darling auntie."

"But have you really no other dresses?"

"There's nothing wrong with these," said Hester; "they're quite
comfortable."

Just at that moment there came peals of laughter proceeding from several
girls' throats. The room-door was burst open, and Sylvia entered first,
her face very red, her eyes bright and defiant, and a tiny piece of raw
meat on a plate in her hand. The girls who followed her did not belong
to the Specialities, but they were all girls of the upper school. Fanny
thanked her stars that they were not particular friends of hers. They
were choking with laughter, and evidently thought they had never seen so
good a sight in their lives.

"Oh, this is too delicious!" said Sibyl Ray, a girl who had just been
admitted into the upper school. "We met this--this young lady, and she
said she wanted to go to the kitchen to get some raw meat; and when I
told her I didn't know the way she just took my hand and drew me along
with her, and said, 'If you possessed a Dickie, and he was dying of
hunger, you wouldn't hesitate to find the kitchen.'"

"Well, I'm not going to interfere," said Fanny; "but I think you know
the rules of the house, Sibyl, and that no girl is allowed in the
kitchen."

"I didn't go in," said Sibyl; "catch me! But I went to the beginning of
the corridor which leads to the kitchen. _She_ went in, though, boldly
enough, and she got it. Now, we do want to see who Dickie is. Is he a
dog, or a monkey, or what?"

"He's a spider--_goose_!" said Sylvia. "And now, please, get out of the
way. He won't eat if you watch him. I've got a good bit of meat, Betty,"
she continued. "It'll keep Dickie going for several days, and he likes
it all the better when it begins to turn. Don't you Dickie?"

"If you don't all leave the room, girls," said Fanny, "I shall have to
report to Miss Symes."

The girls who had entered were rather afraid of Fanny Crawford, and
thought it best to obey her instructions. But the news with regard to
the newcomers spread wildly all over the house; so much so that when, in
course of time, neat-looking Fanny came down to dinner accompanied by
her three cousins, the whole school remained breathless, watching the
Vivians as they entered. But what magical force is there about certain
girls which raises them above the mere accessories of dress? Could there
be anything uglier than the attire of these so-called Scotch lassies?
And was there ever a prouder carriage than that of Betty Vivian, or a
more scornful expression in the eye, or a firmer set of the little lips?

Mrs. Haddo, who always presided at this meal, called the strangers to
come and sit near her; and though the school had great difficulty in not
bursting into a giggle, there was not a sound of any sort whatever as
the three obeyed. Fanny sat down near her friend, Susie Rushworth. Her
eyes spoke volumes. But Susie was gazing at Betty's face.

At dinner, the girls were expected to talk French on certain days of the
week, and German on others. This was French day, and Susie murmured
something to Fanny in that tongue with regard to Betty's remarkable
little face. But Fanny was in no mood to be courteous or kind about her
relatives. Susie was quick to perceive this, and therefore left her
alone.

When dinner came to an end, Mrs. Haddo called the three Vivians into her
private sitting-room. This room was even more elegant than the beautiful
bedroom which they had just vacated. "Now, my dears," she said, "I want
to have a talk with you all."

Sylvia and Hester looked impatient, and shuffled from one ungainly clad
foot to the other; but Mrs. Haddo fixed her eyes on Betty's face, and
again there thrilled through Betty's heart the marvelous sensation that
she had come across a kindred soul. She was incapable, poor child, of
putting the thought into such words; but she felt it, and it thawed her
rebellious spirit.

Mrs. Haddo sat down. "Now," she said, "you call this school, and, having
never been at school before, you doubtless think you are going to be
very miserable?"

"If there's much discipline we shall be," said Hester, "and Betty will
howl."

"_Don't_ talk like that!" said Betty; and there was a tone in her voice
which silenced Hetty, to the little girl's own amazement.

"There will certainly be discipline at school," said Mrs. Haddo, "just
as there is discipline in life. What miserable people we should be
without discipline! Why, we couldn't get on at all. I am not going to
lecture you to-day. As a matter of fact, I never lecture; and I never
expect any young girl to do in my school what I would not endeavor to do
myself. Above all things, I wish to impress one thing upon you. If you
have any sort of trouble--and, of course, dears, you will have
plenty--you must come straight to me and tell me about it. This is a
privilege I permit to very few girls, but I grant it to you. I give you
that full privilege for the first month of your stay at Haddo Court. You
are to come to me as you would to a mother, had you, my poor children, a
mother living."

"Don't! It makes the lump so bad!" said Betty, clasping her rough little
hand against her white throat.

"I think I have said enough on that subject for the present. I am very
curious to hear all about your life on the moors--how you spent your
time, and how you managed your horses and dogs and your numerous pets."

"Do you really want to hear?" said Betty.

"Certainly; I have said so."

"Do you know," said Hetty, "that Sylvia _would_ bring Dickie here.
Betty and I were somewhat against it, although he is a darling. He is
the most precious pet in the world, and Sylvia would not part with him.
We sent her to the kitchen before dinner to get a bit of raw meat for
him. Would you like to see him?"

Mrs. Haddo was silent for a minute. Then she said gently, "Yes, very
much. He is a sort of pet, I suppose?"

"He is a spider," said Betty--"a great, enormous spider. We captured him
when he was small, and we fed him--oh, not on little flies--that would
be cruel--but on morsels of raw meat. Now he is very big, and he has
wicked eyes. I would rather call him Demon than Dickie; but Sylvia named
him Dickie when he was but a baby thing, so the name has stuck to him.
We love him dearly."

"I will come up to your room presently, and you shall show him to me.
Have you brought other pets from the country?"

"Oh, stones and shells and bits of the moor."

"Bits of the moor, my dear children!"

"Yes; we dug pieces up the day before yesterday and wrapped them in
paper, and we want to plant them somewhere here. We thought they would
comfort us. We'd like it awfully if you would let one of the dogs come,
too. He is a great sheep-dog, and such a darling! His name is Andrew. I
think Donald Macfarlane would part with him if you said we might have
him."

"I am afraid I can't just at present, dear; but if you are really good
girls, and try your very best to please me, you shall go back to Donald
Macfarlane in the holidays, and perhaps I will go with you, and you will
show me all your favorite haunts."

"Oh, will you?" said Betty. Her eyes grew softer than ever.

"You are quite a dear for a head mistress," said Sylvia. "We've always
read in books that they are such horrors. It is nice for you to say you
will come."

"Well, now, I want to say something else, and then we'll go up to your
room and see Dickie. I am going to take you three girls up to town
to-morrow to buy you the sort of dresses we wear in this part of the
world. You can put away these most sensible frocks for your next visit
to Craigie Muir. Not a word, dears. You have said I am a very nice head
mistress, and I hope you will continue to think so. Now, let us come up
to your room."




CHAPTER V

THE VIVIANS' ATTIC


Mrs. Haddo was genuinely interested in Dickie. She never once spoke of
him as a horror. She immediately named the genus to which he belonged in
the spider tribe, and told the girls that they could look up full
particulars with regard to him and his ways in a large book she had
downstairs called "Chambers's Encyclopedia." She suggested, however,
that they should have a little room in one of the attics where they
could keep Dickie and his morsels of meat, and the different boxes which
contained the caterpillars. She volunteered to show this minute room to
the young Vivians at once.

They looked at her, as she spoke, with more and more interest and less
and less dislike. Even Sylvia's little heart was melted, and Hetty at
once put out her hand and touched Mrs. Haddo's. In a moment the little
brown hand was held in the firm clasp of the white one, which was
ornamented with sparkling rings.

As the children and Mrs. Haddo were leaving the blue room, Mrs. Haddo's
eyes fell upon the deal trunks. "What very sensible trunks!" she said.
"And so you brought your clothes in these?"

"Yes," replied Betty. "Donald Macfarlane made them for us. He can do
all sorts of carpentering. He meant to paint them green; but we thought
we'd like them best just as they are unpainted."

"They are strong, useful boxes," replied Mrs. Haddo. "And now come with
me and I will show you the room which shall be your private property and
where you can keep your pets. By the way," she added, "I am exceedingly
particular with regard to the neatness of the various rooms where my
pupils sleep; and these bits of heather and these curious stones--oh, I
can tell you plenty about their history by and by--might also be put
into what we will call 'the Vivians' attic.'"

"Thank you so much!" said Betty. She had forgotten all about
howling--she had even forgotten for the minute that she was really at
school; for great Mrs. Haddo, the wonderful head mistress, about whom
Fanny had told so many stories, was really a most agreeable
person--nearly, very nearly, as nice as dear Aunt Frances.

The little attic was presently reached; the pets were deposited there;
and then--wonderful to relate!--Mrs. Haddo went out herself with the
girls and chose the very best position in the grounds for them to plant
the pieces of heather, with their roots and surrounding earth. She gave
to each girl a small plot which was to be her very own, and which no
other girl was to have anything whatever to do with. When presently she
introduced them into the private sitting-room of the upper school,
Betty's eyes were shining quite happily; and Sylvia and Hetty, who
always followed her example, were looking as merry as possible.

Fanny Crawford, being requested to do so by Susie Rushworth, now
introduced the Vivians to the Specialities. Mary and Julia Bertram shook
hands with them quite warmly. Margaret Grant smiled for a minute as her
dark, handsome eyes met those of Betty; while Olive Repton said in her
most genial tone, "Oh, do sit down, and tell us all about your life!"

"Yes, please--_please_, tell us all about your life!" exclaimed another
voice; and Sibyl Ray came boldly forward and seated herself in the midst
of the group, which was known in the school as the Specialities.

But here Margaret interfered. "You shall hear everything presently,
Sibyl," she said; "but just now we are having a little confab with dear
Fanny's friends, so do you mind leaving us alone together?"

Sibyl colored angrily. "I am sure I don't care," she said; "and if you
are going to be stuck-up and snappish and disagreeable just because you
happen to call yourselves the Specialities, you needn't expect _me_ to
take an interest in you. I am just off for a game of tennis, and shall
have a far better time than you all, hobnobbing in this close room."

"Yes, the room is very close," exclaimed Betty. Then she added, "I do
not think I shall like the South of England at all; it seems to be
without air."

"Oh, you'll soon get over that!" laughed Susie. "Besides," she
continued, "winter is coming; and I can tell you we find winter very
cold, even here."

"I am glad of that," said Betty. "I hate hot weather; unless, indeed,"
she added, "when you can lie flat on your back, in the center of one of
the moors, and watch the sky with the sun blazing down on you."

"But you must never lie anywhere near a flat stone," exclaimed Sylvia,
"or an adder may come out, and that isn't a bit jolly!"

Sibyl had not yet moved off, but was standing with her mouth slightly
gaping and her round eyes full of horror.

"Do go! do go, Sibyl!" said Mary Bertram; and Sibyl went, to tell
wonderful stories to her own special friends all about these oddest of
girls who kept monstrous spiders--spiders that had to be fed on raw
meat--and who themselves lay on the moors where adders were to be found.

"Now tell us about Dickie," said Susie, who was always the first to make
friends.

But Betty Vivian, for some unaccountable reason, no longer felt either
amiable or sociable. "There's nothing to tell," she replied, "and you
can't see him."

"Oh, please, Betty, don't be disagreeable!" exclaimed Fanny. "We can see
him any minute if we go to your bedroom."

"No, you can't," said Betty, "for he isn't there."

Fanny burst out laughing. "Ah," she said, "I thought as much! I thought
Mrs. Haddo would soon put an end to poor Dickie's life!"

"Then you thought wrong!" exclaimed Sylvia with flashing eyes, "for Mrs.
Haddo loves him. She was down on her knees looking----Oh, what is the
matter, Betty?"

"If you keep repeating our secrets with Mrs. Haddo I shall pinch you
black and blue to-night," was Betty's response.

Sylvia instantly became silent.

"Well, tell us about the moor, anyhow," said Margaret.

"And let's go out!" cried Olive. "The day is perfectly glorious; and, of
course," she continued, "we are all bound to make ourselves agreeable to
you three, for we owe our delightful half-holiday to you. But for you
Vivians we'd be toiling away at our lessons now instead of allowing our
minds to cool down."

"Do minds get as hot as all that?" asked Hester.

"Very often, indeed, at this school," said Olive with a chuckle.

"Well, I, for one, shall be delighted to go out," said Betty.

"Then you must run upstairs and get your hats and your gloves," said
Fanny, who seemed, for some extraordinary reason, to wish to make her
cousins uncomfortable.

Betty looked at her very fiercely for a minute; then she beckoned to her
sisters, and the three left the room in their usual fashion--each girl
holding the hand of another.

"Fan," said Olive the moment the door had closed behind them, "you don't
like the Vivians! I see it in your face."

"I never said so," replied Fanny.

"Oh, Fan, dear--not with the lips, of course; but the eyes have spoken
volumes. Now, I think they are great fun; they're so uncommon."

"I have never said I didn't like them," repeated Fanny, "and you will
never get me to say it. They are my cousins, and of course I'll have to
look after them a bit; but I think before they are a month at the school
you will agree with me in my opinion with regard to them."

"How can we agree in an opinion we know nothing about?" said Margaret
Grant.

Fanny looked at her, and Fanny's eyes could flash in a very significant
manner at times.

"Let's come out!" exclaimed Susie Rushworth. "The girls will follow us."

This, however, turned out not to be the case. Susie, the Bertrams,
Margaret Grant, Olive Repton, waited for the Vivians in every imaginable
spot where they it likely the newcomers would be.

As a matter of fact, the very instant the young Vivians had left the
sitting-room, Betty whispered in an eager tone, first to one sister and
then to the other, "We surely needn't stay any longer with Fanny and
those other horrid girls. Never mind your hats and gloves. Did we ever
wear hats and gloves when we were out on the moors at Craigie Muir?
There's an open door. Let's get away quite by ourselves."

The Vivians managed this quite easily. They raced down a side-walk until
they came to an overhanging oak tree of enormous dimensions. Into this
tree they climbed, getting up higher and higher until they were lost to
view in the topmost branches. Here they contrived to make a cozy nest
for themselves, where they sat very close together, not talking much,
although Betty now and then said calmly, "I like Mrs. Haddo; she is the
only one in the whole school I can tolerate."

"Fan's worse than ever!" exclaimed Sylvia.

"Oh, don't let's talk of her!" said Betty.

"It will be rather fun going to London to-morrow," said Hester.

"Fun!" exclaimed Betty. "I suppose we shall be put into odious
fashionable dresses, like those stuck-up dolls the other girls. But I
don't think, try as they will, they'll ever turn _me_ into a fashionable
lady. How I do hate that sort!"

"Yes, and so do I," said Sylvia; while Hetty, who always echoed her
sisters' sentiments, said ditto.

"Mrs. Haddo was kind about Dickie," said Betty after a thoughtful pause.

"And it is nice," added Sylvia, "to have the Vivian attic."

"Oh, dear!" said Hester; "I wish all those girls would keep out of
sight, for then I'd dash back to the house and bring out the pieces of
heather and plant them right away. They ought not to be long out of the
ground."

"You had best go at once," said Betty, giving Hester a somewhat vigorous
push, which very nearly upset the little girl's balance. "Go boldly back
to the house; don't be afraid of any one; don't speak to any one unless
it happens to be Mrs. Haddo. Be sure you are polite to her, for she is a
lady. Go up to the Vivian attic and bring down the clumps of heather,
and the little spade we brought with us in the very bottom of the fifth
trunk."

"Oh, and there's the watering-can; don't forget that!" cried Sylvia.

"Yes, bring the watering-can, too. You had best find a pump, or a well,
or something, so that you can fill it up to the brim. Bring them all
along; and then just whistle 'Robin Adair' at the foot of this tree, and
we two will come swarming down. Now, off with you; there's no time to
lose!"

Hester descended without a word. She was certainly born without a scrap
of fear of any kind, and adventure appealed to her plucky little spirit.
Betty settled herself back comfortably against one of the forked
branches of the tree where she had made her nest.

"If we are careful, Sylvia, we can come up here to hide as often as we
like. I rather fancy from the shape of those other girls that they're
not specially good at climbing trees."

"What do you mean by their shape?" asked Sylvia.

"Oh, they're so squeezed in and pushed out; I don't know how to explain
it. Now, _we_ have the use of all our limbs; and I say, you silly little
Sylvia, won't we use them just!"

"I always love you, Betty, when you call me 'silly little Sylvia,' for I
know you are in a good humor and not inclined to howl. But, before Hetty
comes back, I want to say something."

"How mysterious you look, Sylvia! What can you have to say that poor
Hetty's not to hear? I am not going to have secrets that are not shared
among us three, I can tell you. We share and share alike--we three. We
are just desolate orphans, alone in the world; but at least we share and
share alike."

"Of course, of course," said Sylvia; "but I saw--and I don't think Hetty
did----"

"And what did you see?"

"I saw Fan looking at us; and then she came rather close. It was that
time when we were all stifling in that odious sitting-room; Fan came and
sat very close to you, and I saw her put her hand down to feel your
dress. I know she felt that flat pocket where the little sealed packet
is."

Betty's face grew red and then white.

"And don't you remember," continued Sylvia, "that Fan was with us on the
very, very day when darling auntie told us about the packet--the day
when you came out of her room with your eyes as red as a ferret's; and
don't you remember how you couldn't help howling that day, and how far
off we had to go for fear darlingest auntie would hear you? And can't
you recall that Fan crept after us, just like the horrid sneak that she
is? And I know she heard you say, 'That packet is mine; it belongs to
all of us, and I--I _will_ keep it, whatever happens.'"

"She may do sneaky things of that sort every hour of every day that she
likes," was Betty's cool rejoinder. "Now, don't get into a fright, silly
little Sylvia. Oh, I say, hark! that's Hester's note. She is whistling
'Robin Adair'!"

Quick as thought, the girls climbed down from the great tree and stood
under it. Hester was panting a little, for she had run fast and her arms
were very full.

"I saw a lot of _them_ scattered everywhere!" she exclaimed; "but I
don't _think_ they saw me, but of course I couldn't be sure. Here's the
heather; its darling little bells are beginning to droop, poor sweet
pets! And here's the spade; and here's the watering-can, brimful of
water, too, for I saw a gardener as I was coming along, and I asked him
to fill it for me, and he did so at once. Now let's go to our gardens
and let's plant. We've just got a nice sod of heather each--one for each
garden. Oh, do let's be quick, or those dreadful girls will see us!"

"There's no need to hurry," said Betty. "I rather think I can take care
of myself. Give me the watering-can. Sylvia, take the heather; and,
Hetty--your face is perfectly scarlet, you have run so fast--you follow
after with the spade."

The little plots of ground which had been given over to the Vivian girls
had been chosen by Mrs. Haddo on the edge of a wild, uncultivated piece
of ground. The girls of Haddo Court were proud of this piece of land,
which some of them--Margaret Grant, in particular--were fond of calling
the "forest primeval." But the Vivians, fresh from the wild Scotch
moors, thought but poorly of the few acres of sparse grass and tangled
weed and low under-growth. It was, however, on the very edge of this
piece of land that the three little gardens were situated. Mrs. Haddo
did nothing by halves; and already--wonderful to relate--the gardens had
been marked out with stakes and pieces of stout string, and there was a
small post planted at the edge of the center garden containing the words
in white paint: THE VIVIANS' PRIVATE GARDENS.

Even Betty laughed. "This is good!" she said. "Girls, that is quite a
nice woman."

The twins naturally acknowledged as very nice indeed any one whom Betty
admired.

Betty here gave a profound sigh. "Come along; let's be quick," she said.
"We'll plant our heather in the very center of each plot. I'll have the
middle plot, of course, being the eldest. You, silly Sylvia, shall have
the one on the left-hand side; and you, Het, the one on the right-hand
side. I will plant my heather first."

The others watched while Betty dug vigorously, and had soon made a hole
large enough and soft enough to inclose the roots of the wild Scotch
heather. She then gave her spade to Sylvia, who did likewise; then
Hetty, in her turn, also planted a clump of heather. The contents of the
watering-can was presently dispersed among the three clumps, and the
girls turned back in the direction of the house.

"She _is_ nice!" said Betty. "I will bring her here the first day she
has a minute to spare and show her the heather. She said she knew all
about Scotch heather, and loved it very much. I shouldn't greatly mind,
for my part, letting her know about the packet."

"Oh, better not!" said Hester in a frightened tone. "Remember, she is
not the only one in that huge prison of a house." Here she pointed to
the great mansion which constituted the vast edifice, Haddo Court. "She
is by no means the only one," continued Hester. "If she were, I could be
happy here."

"You are right, Het; you are quite a wise, small girl," said Betty. "Oh,
dear," she added, "how I hate those monstrous houses! What would not I
give to be back in the little, white stone house at Craigie Muir!"

"And with darling Jean and dearest old Donald!" exclaimed Sylvia.

"Yes, and the dogs," said Hester. "Oh, Andrew! oh, Fritz! are you
missing us as much as we miss you? And, David, you darling! are you
pricking up your ears, expecting us to come round to you with some
carrots?"

"We'd best not begin too much of this sort of talk," said Betty. "We've
got to make up our minds to be cheerful--that is, if we wish to please
Mrs. Haddo."

The thought of Mrs. Haddo was certainly having a remarkable effect on
Betty; and there is no saying how soon she might, in consequence, have
been reconciled to her school-life but for an incident which took place
that very evening. For Fanny Crawford, who would not tell a tale against
another for the world, had been much troubled since she heard of her
cousins' arrival. Her conscientious little mind had told her that they
were the last sort of girls suitable to be in such a school as Haddo
Court. She had found out something about them. She had not meant to spy
on them during her brief visit to Craigie Muir, but she had certainly
overheard some of Betty's passionate words about the little packet; and
that very evening, curled up on the sofa in the tiny sitting-room at
Craigie Muir Cottage, she had seen Betty--although Betty had not seen
her--creep into the room in the semi-darkness and remove a little sealed
packet from one of Miss Vivian's drawers. As Fanny expressed it
afterwards, she felt at the moment as though her tongue would cleave to
the roof of her mouth. She had tried to utter some sound, but none
would come. She had never mentioned the incident to any one; and as she
scarcely expected to see anything more of her cousins in the future, she
tried to dismiss it from her thoughts. But as soon as ever she was told
in confidence by Miss Symes that the Vivian girls were coming to Haddo
Court, she recalled the incident of what she was pleased to regard as
the stolen packet. It had haunted her while she was at Craigie Muir; it
had even horrified her. Her whole nature recoiled against what she
considered clandestine and underhand dealings. Nevertheless she could
not, she would not, tell. But she had very nearly made up her mind to
say something to the girls themselves--to ask Betty why she had taken
the packet, and what she had done with it. But even on this course she
was not fully decided.

On the morning of that very day, however, just before Fanny bade her
father good-bye, he had said to her, "Fan, my dear, there's a trifle
worrying me, although I don't suppose for a single moment you can help
me in the matter."

"What is it, father?" asked the girl.

"Well, the fact is this. I am going, as you know, to India for the next
few years, and it is quite possible that as the cottage at Craigie Muir
will belong to the Vivian girls--for poor Frances bought it and allowed
those Scotch folk the Macfarlanes to live there--it is, I say, quite
possible that you may go to Craigie Muir for a summer holiday with your
cousins. The air is superb, and would do you much good, and of course
the girls would be wild with delight. Well, my dear, if you go, I want
you to look round everywhere--you have good, sharp eyes in your head,
Fan, my girl--and try if you can find a little sealed packet which poor
Frances left to be taken care of by me for your three cousins."

"A sealed packet?" said Fanny. She felt herself turning very pale.

"Yes. Do you know anything about it?"

"Oh, father!" said poor Fanny; and her eyes filled with tears.

"What is the matter, my child?"

"I--I'd so much rather not talk about it, please."

"Then you do know something?"

"Please, please, father, don't question me!"

"I won't if you don't wish it; but your manner puzzles me a good deal.
Well, dear, if you can get it by any chance, you had better put it into
Mrs. Haddo's charge until I return. I asked those poor children if they
had seen it, and they denied having done so."

Fanny felt herself shiver, and had to clasp her hands very tightly
together.

"I also asked that good shepherd Donald Macfarlane and his wife, and
they certainly knew nothing about it. I can't stay with you any longer
now, my little girl; but if you do happen to go to Craigie Muir you
might remember that I am a little anxious on the subject, for it is my
wish to carry out the directions of my dear cousin Frances in all
particulars. Now, try to be very, very good to your cousins, Fan; and
remember how lonely they are, and how differently they have been brought
up from you."

Fanny could not speak, for she was crying too hard. Sir John presently
went away, and forgot all about the little packet. But Fanny remembered
it; in fact, she could not get it out of her head during the entire day;
and in the course of the afternoon, when she found that the Vivian girls
joined the group of the Specialities, she forced a chair between Betty
and Olive Repton, and seated herself on it, and purposely, hating
herself all the time for doing so, felt Betty's pocket. Beyond doubt
there was something hard in it. It was not a pocket-handkerchief, nor
did it feel like a pencil or a knife or anything of that sort.

"I shall know no peace," thought Fanny to herself, "until I get that
unhappy girl to tell the truth and return the packet to me. I shall be
very firm and very kind, and I will never let out a single thing about
it in the school. But the packet must be given up; and then I will
manage to convey it to Mrs. Haddo, who will keep it until dear father
returns."

But although Fan intended to act the part of the very virtuous and
proper girl, she did not like her cousins the more because of this
unpleasant incident. Fanny Crawford had a certain strength of character;
but it is sad to relate that she was somewhat overladen with
self-righteousness, and was very proud of the fact that nothing would
induce _her_ to do a dishonorable thing. She sadly lacked Mrs. Haddo's
rare and large sympathy and deep knowledge of life, and Fanny certainly
had not the slightest power of reading character.

That very evening, therefore, when the Vivian girls had gone to their
room, feeling very tired and sleepy, and by no means so unhappy as they
expected, Fanny first knocked at their door and then boldly entered.
Each girl had removed her frock and was wearing a little, rough, gray
dressing-gown, and each girl was in the act of brushing out her own very
thick hair.

"Brushing-hair time!" exclaimed Fanny in a cheerful tone. "I trust I am
not in the way."

"We were going to bed," remarked Betty.

"Oh, Betty, what a reproachful tone!" Fanny tried to carry matters off
with a light hand. "Surely I, your own cousin, am welcome? Do say I am
welcome, dear Betty! and let me bring my brush and comb, and brush my
hair in your room."

"No," said Betty; "you are not welcome, and we'd all much rather that
you brushed your hair in your own room."

"You certainly are sweetly polite," said Fanny, with a smile on her face
which was not remarkable for sweetness. She looked quite calmly at the
girls for a moment. Then she said, "This day, on account of your
arrival, rules are off, so to speak, but they begin again to-morrow
morning. To-morrow evening, therefore, I cannot come to your bedroom,
for it would be breaking rules."

"Oh, how just awfully jolly!" exclaimed Sylvia.

"Thanks," said Fanny. She paused again for a minute. Then she added,
"But as rules are off, I may as well say that I have come here to-night
on purpose. Just before father left, he told me that there was a little
sealed packet"--Betty sat plump down on the side of her bed; Sylvia and
Hetty caught each others hands--"a little sealed packet," continued
Fanny, "which belonged to poor Miss Vivian--your aunt Frances--and which
father was to take charge of for you."

"No, he wasn't," said Betty; "you make a mistake."

"Nonsense, Betty! Father never makes a mistake. Anyhow, he has Miss
Vivian's letter, which proves the whole thing. Now, the packet cannot be
found. Father is quite troubled about it. He says he has not an idea
what it contains, but it was left to be placed under his care. He asked
you three about it, and you said you knew nothing. He also asked the
servants in that ugly little house----"

"How dare you call it ugly?" said Betty.

"Well, well, pray don't get into a passion! Anyhow, you all denied any
knowledge of the packet. Now, I may as well confess that, although I
have not breathed the subject to any one, I saw you, Betty, with my own
eyes, take it out of Miss Vivian's drawer. I was lying on the sofa in
the dark, or almost in the dark, and you never noticed me; but I saw you
open the drawer and take the packet out. That being the case, you _do_
know all about it, and you have told a lie. Please, Betty, give me the
packet, and I will take it to-morrow to Mrs. Haddo, and she will look
after it for you until father returns; and I promise you faithfully that
I will never tell a soul what you did, nor the lie you told father about
it. Now, Betty, do be sensible. Give it to me, without any delay. I
felt it in the pocket under your dress to-day, so you can't deny that
you have it."

Fanny's face was very red when she had finished speaking, and there were
two other faces in that room which were even redder; but another face
was very pale, with shining eyes and a defiant, strange expression about
the lips.

The three Vivians now came up to Fanny, who, although older than the two
younger girls, was built much more slightly, and, compared with them,
had no muscle at all. Betty was a very strong girl for her age.

"Come," said Betty, "we are not going to waste words on you. Just march
out of this!"

"I--what do you mean?"

"March! This is our room, our private room, and therefore our castle. If
you like to play the spy, you can; but you don't come in here. Go
along--be quick--out you go!"

A strong hand took Fanny forcibly by her right arm, and a strong hand
took her with equal force by her left, then two very powerful hands
pushed from behind; so that Fanny Crawford, who considered herself one
of the most dignified and lady-like girls in the school, was summarily
ejected. She went into her room, looked at the cruel marks on her arms
caused by the angry girls, and burst into tears.

Miss Symes came in and found Fanny crying, and did her best to comfort
the girl. "What is wrong, dear?" she said.

"Oh, don't--don't ask me!" said poor Fanny.

"You are fretting about your father, darling."

"It's not that," said Fanny; "and I can't ever tell you, dear St.
Cecilia. Oh, please, leave me! Oh, oh, I am unhappy!"

Miss Symes, finding she could do no good, and believing that Fanny must
be a little hysterical on account of her father, went away. When she
had gone Fanny dried her eyes, and stayed for a long time lost in
thought. She had meant to be good, after her fashion, to the Vivian
girls; but, after their treatment of her, she felt that she understood
for the first time what hate really meant. If she could not force the
girls to deliver up the packet, she might even consider it her duty to
tell the whole story to Mrs. Haddo. Never before in the annals of that
great school had a Speciality been known to tell a story of another
girl. But Fanny reflected that there were great moments in life which
required that a rule should be broken.




CHAPTER VI

A CRISIS


The Specialities had made firm rules for themselves. Their numbers were
few, for only those who could really rise to a high ideal were permitted
to join.

The head of the Specialities was Margaret Grant. It was she who first
thought of this little scheme for bringing the girls she loved best into
closer communion each with the other. She had consulted Susie Rushworth,
Fanny Crawford, Mary and Julia Bertram, and Olive Repton. Up to the
present there were no other members of the Speciality Club. These girls
managed it their own way. They had their private meetings, their earnest
conversations, and their confessions each to make to the other. They
swore eternal friendship. They had all things in common--that is,
concealments were not permitted amongst the Specialities; and the
influence of this small and apparently unimportant club did much towards
the formation of the characters of its members.

Now, as poor Fanny sat alone in her pretty room she thought, and
thought again, over what had occurred. According to the rules of the
club to which she belonged, she ought to consult the other girls with
regard to what the Vivians had done. _The_ great rule of the
Specialities was "No secrets." Each must know all that the others knew.
Never before in the annals of the school had there been a secret of such
importance--in short, such a horrible secret--to divulge. Fanny made up
her mind that she could not do it.

There was to be a great meeting of the Specialities on the following
evening. They usually met in each other's bedrooms, taking the task of
offering hospitality turn and turn about. At these little social
gatherings they had cocoa, tempting cakes, and chocolate creams; here
they laughed and chatted, sometimes having merely a merry evening, at
others discussing gravely the larger issues of life. Fanny was the one
who was to entertain the Specialities on the following evening, and she
made preparations accordingly. Sir John had brought her a particularly
tempting cake from Buzzard's, a couple of pounds of the best chocolate
creams, a tin of delicious cocoa, and, last but not least, a beautiful
little set of charming cups and saucers and tiny plates, and real silver
spoons, also little silver knives. Notwithstanding her grief at parting
from her father, Fanny was delighted with her present. Hitherto there
had been no attempt at style in these brief meetings of the friends. But
Fanny's next entertainment was to be done properly.

There was no secret about these gatherings. Miss Symes had been told
that these special girls wanted to meet once a week between nine and ten
o'clock in their respective bedrooms. She had carried the information to
Mrs. Haddo, who had immediately given the desired permission, telling
the girls that they might hold their meeting until the great bell rang
for chapel. Prayers were always read at a quarter to ten in the
beautiful chapel belonging to Haddo Court, but only the girls of the
upper school attended in the evening. Fanny would have been in the
highest spirits to-night were it not for the Vivians, were it not for
the consciousness that she was in possession of a secret--a really
terrible secret--which she must not tell to her companions. Yes, she
must break her rule; she must not tell.

She lay down on her bed at last and fell asleep, feeling tired and very
miserable. She was horrified at Betty's conduct with regard to the
little packet, and could not feel a particle of sympathy for the other
girls in the matter.

It was soon after midnight on that same eventful night. The great clock
over the stables had struck twelve, and sweet chimes had come from the
other clock in the little tower of the chapel. The whole house was
wrapped in profound slumber. Even Mrs. Haddo had put away all cares, and
had laid her head on her pillow; even the Rev. Edmund Fairfax and his
wife had put out the lights in their special wing of the Court, and had
gone to sleep.

It was shortly after the clocks had done their midnight work that Betty
Vivian raised herself very slowly and cautiously on her elbow, and
touched Sylvia on her low, white forehead. The little girl started,
opened her eyes, and was about to utter an exclamation when Betty
whispered, "Don't make a sound, silly Sylvia! It's only me--Betty. I
want you to get very wide awake. And now you are wide awake, aren't
you?"

"Yes, oh yes," said Sylvia; "but I don't know where I am. Oh yes, of
course I remember; I am in----"

"You are in prison!" whispered Betty back to her. "Now, lie as still as
a statue while I waken Hester."

Soon the two little sisters were wide awake.

"Now, both of you creep very softly into my bed. We can all squeeze up
together if we try hard."

"Lovely, darlingest Betty!" whispered Sylvia.

"You are nice, Bet!" exclaimed Hester.

"Now I want to speak," said Betty. "You know the packet?"

The two younger girls squeezed Betty's hands by way of answer.

"You know how _she_ spoke to-night?"

Another squeeze of Betty's hands, a squeeze which was almost ferocious
this time.

"Do you think," continued Betty, "that she is going to have her way, and
we are going to give it up to her?"

"Of course not," said Sylvia.

"I might," said Betty--"I _might_ have asked Mrs. Haddo to look after it
for me; but never now--never! Girls, we've got to bury it!"

"Oh Bet!" whispered Sylvia.

"We can't!" said Hester with a sort of little pant.

"We can, and we will," said Betty. "I've thought it all out. I am going
to bury it my own self this very minute."

"Betty, how--where? Betty, what do you mean?"

"You must help me," said Betty. "First of all, I am going to get up and
put on my thick skirt of black serge. I won't make a sound, for that
creature Fan sleeps next door. Lie perfectly still where you are while I
am getting ready."

The girls obeyed. It was fearfully exciting, lying like this almost in
the dark; for there was scarcely any moon, and the dim light in the
garden could hardly be called light at all. Betty moved mysteriously
about the room, and presently came up to her two sisters.

"Now, you do exactly what you are told."

"Yes, Betty, we will."

"I am going, first of all," said Betty, "to fetch the little spade."

"Oh Bet, you'll wake the house!"

"No," said Betty. She moved towards the door. She was a very observant
girl, and had noticed that no door creaked in that well-conducted
mansion, that no lock was out of order. She managed to open the door of
her bedroom without making the slightest sound. She managed to creep
upstairs and reach the Vivian attic. She found the little spade and
brought it down again. She re-entered the beautiful big bedroom and
closed the door softly.

"Here's the spade!" she whispered to her sisters. "Did you hear me
move?"

"No, Bet. Oh, you are wonderful!"

"Now," said Betty, "we must take the sheets off our three beds. The
three top sheets will do. Sylvia, begin to knot the sheets together.
Make the knots very strong, and be quick about it."

Sylvia obeyed without a word.

"Hester, come and help me," said Betty now. She took the other twin's
hand and led her to one of the French windows. The window happened to be
a little open, for the night was a very warm and balmy one. Betty pushed
it wider open, and the next minute she was standing on the balcony.

"Go back," she whispered, speaking to Hester, "and bring Sylvia out with
the sheets!"

In a very short time Sylvia appeared, dragging what looked like a
tangled white rope along with her.

"Now, then," said Betty, "you've got to let me down to the ground by
means of these sheets. I am a pretty good weight, you know, and you
mustn't drop me; for if you did I might break my leg or something, and
that would be horrid. You two have got to hold one end of these knotted
sheets as firmly as ever you can, and not let go on any account. Now,
then--here goes!"

The next instant Betty had clutched hold of one of the sheets herself,
and had climbed over the somewhat high parapet of the balcony. A minute
later, still firmly holding the white rope, she was gradually letting
herself down to the ground, hand over hand. By-and-by she reached the
bottom. When she did this she held up both hands, which the girls, as
they watched her from above, could just see. She was demanding the
little spade. Sylvia flung it on the soft grass which lay beneath. Betty
put her hand, making a sort of trumpet of it, round her lips, and
whispered up, "Stay where you are till I return."

She then marched off into the shrubbery. She was absent for about twenty
minutes, during which time both Sylvia and Hetty felt exceedingly cold.
She then came back, fastened the little spade securely into the broad
belt of her dress, and, aided by her sisters, pulled herself up and up,
and so on to the balcony once more.

The three girls re-entered the bedroom. Not a soul in that great house
had heard them, or seen them, or knew anything about their adventure.

"It is quite safe now--poor, beautiful darling!" whispered Betty.
"Girls, we must smooth out these sheets; they _do_ look rather dragged.
And now we'll get straight into bed."

"I am very cold," said Sylvia.

"You'll be warm again in a minute," replied Betty; "and what does a
little cold matter when I have saved _It_? No, I am not going to tell
you where it is; just because it's safer, dear, dearest, for you not to
know."

"Yes, it's safer," said Sylvia.

The three sisters lay down again. By slow degrees warmth returned to the
half-frozen limbs of the poor little twins, and they dropped asleep. But
Betty lay awake--warm, excited, triumphant.

"I've managed things now," she thought; "and if every girl in the school
asks me if I have a little packet, and if every teacher does likewise,
I'll be able truthfully to say 'No.'"

Early the next morning Mrs. Haddo announced her intention to take the
Vivians to London. School-work was in full swing that day; and Susie,
Margaret, Olive, and the other members of the Specialities rather envied
the Vivians when they saw them driving away in Mrs. Haddo's most elegant
landau to the railway station.

Sibyl Ray openly expressed her sentiments on the occasion. She turned to
her companion, who was standing near. "I must say, and I may as well say
it first as last, that I do not understand your adorable Mrs. Haddo. Why
should she make such a fuss over common-looking girls like those?"

"Do you call the Vivians common-looking girls?" was Martha West's
response.

"Of course I do, and even worse. Why, judging from their dress, they
might have come out of a laborer's cottage."

"Granted," replied Martha; "but then," she added, "they have something
else, each of them, better than dress."

"Oh, if you begin to talk in enigmas I for one shall cease to be your
friend," answered Sibyl. "What have they got that is so wonderful?"

"It was born in them," replied Martha. "If you can't see it for
yourself, Sibyl, I am not able to show it to you."

Mrs. Haddo took the girls to London and gave them a very good day. It is
true they spent a time which seemed intolerably long to Betty in having
pretty white blouses and smartly made skirts and neat little jackets
fitted on. They spent a still more intolerable time at the dressmaker's
in being measured for soft, pretty evening-dresses. They went to a
hairdresser, who cut their very thick hair and tied it with broad black
ribbon. They next went to a milliner and had several hats tried on. They
went to a sort of all-round shop, where they bought gloves, boots, and
handkerchiefs innumerable, and some very soft black cashmere and even
black silk stockings. Oh, but _they_ didn't care; they thought the
whole time wasted. Nevertheless they submitted, and with a certain
grace; for was not the precious packet safe--so safe that no one could
possibly discover its whereabouts? And was not Betty feeling her queer,
sensitive heart expanding more and more under Mrs. Haddo's kind
influence?

"Now, my dears," said that good lady, "we will go back to Miss Watts the
dressmaker at three o clock; but we have still two hours to spare.
During that time we'll have a little lunch, for I am sure you must be
hungry; and afterwards I will take you to the Wallace Collection, which
I think you will enjoy."

"What's a collection?" asked Sylvia.

"There are some rooms not far from here where beautiful things are
collected--pictures and other lovely things of all sorts and
descriptions. I think that you, at least, Betty, will love to look at
them."

Betty afterwards felt, deep down in her heart, that this whole day was a
wonderful dream. She was starvingly hungry, to begin with, and enjoyed
the excellent lunch that Mrs. Haddo ordered at the confectioners. She
felt a sense of curious joy and fear as she looked at one or two of the
great pictures in the Wallace Collection, and so excited and uplifted
was she altogether that she scarcely noticed when they returned to the
shops and the coarse, ugly black serges were exchanged for pretty coats
and skirts of the finest cloth, for neat little white blouses, for
pretty shoes and fine stockings. She did not even object to the hat,
which, with its plume of feathers, gave a look of distinction to her
little face. She was not elated over her fine clothes, neither was she
annoyed about them.

"Now, Miss Watts," said Mrs. Haddo in a cheerful tone, "you will hurry
with the rest of the young ladies' things, and send them to me as soon
as ever you can. I shall want their evening-dresses, without fail, by
the beginning of next week."

They all went down into the street. Sylvia found herself casting shy
glances at Betty. It seemed to her that her sister was changed--that she
scarcely knew her. Dress did not make such a marked difference in
Hetty's appearance; but Hetty too looked a different girl.

"And now we are going to the Zoological Gardens," said Mrs. Haddo,
"where we may find some spiders like Dickie, and where you will see all
sorts of wonderful creatures."

"Oh Mrs. Haddo!" exclaimed Betty.

They spent an hour or two in that place so fascinating for children, and
arrived back at Haddo Court just in time for supper.

"We have had a happy day, have we not?" said Mrs. Haddo, looking into
Betty's face and observing the brightness of her eyes.

"Very happy, and it was you who gave it to us," answered the girl.

"And to-morrow," continued Mrs. Haddo, "must be just as happy--just as
happy--because lessons will begin; and to an intelligent and clever girl
there is nothing in the world so delightful as a difficulty conquered
and knowledge acquired."

That evening, when the Vivian girls entered the room where supper was
served, every girl in the upper school turned to look at them. The
change in their appearance was at once complete and arresting. They
walked well by nature. They were finely made girls, and had not a scrap
of self-consciousness.

"Oh, I say, Fan," whispered Susie in her dear friend's ear, "your
cousins will boss the whole school if this sort of thing goes on. To be
frank with you, Fan, I have fallen in love with that magnificent Betty
myself. There is nothing I wouldn't do for her."

"You ought not to whisper in English, ought you?" was Fanny's very
significant response, uttered in the German tongue.

Susie shrugged her shoulders. The Specialities generally sat close to
each other; and she looked down the table now, and saw that Margaret,
and the Bertrams, and Olive Repton were equally absorbed in watching the
Vivian girls. Nothing more was said about them, however; and when the
meal came to an end Miss Symes took them away with her, to give them
brief directions with regard to their work for the morrow. She also
supplied them with a number of new books, which Betty received with
rapture, for she adored reading, and hitherto had hardly been able to
indulge in it. Miss Symes tried to explain to the girls something of the
school routine; and she showed each girl her own special desk in the
great schoolroom, where she could keep her school-books, and her
different papers, pens, pencils, ink, etc.

"I cannot tell until to-morrow what forms you will be in, my dears; but
I think Betty will probably have a good deal to do with me in her daily
tuition; whereas you, Sylvia, and you, Hester, will be under the charge
of Miss Oxley. I must introduce you to Miss Oxley to-morrow morning. And
now you would like, I am sure, to go to bed. Mrs. Haddo says that you
needn't attend prayers to-night, for you have had a long and tiring day;
so you may go at once to your room."

The girls thanked Miss Symes, and went. They heard voices busily
conversing in Fanny's room--eager voices, joined to occasional peals of
merry laughter. But they were too tired, too sleepy, and, it may be
added, too happy, to worry themselves much over these matters. They were
very quickly in bed and sound asleep.

Meanwhile Fanny was much enjoying the unstinted praise which her friends
were bestowing on the beautiful tea-set which her father had given her.

"Oh, but it is perfectly lovely!" exclaimed Olive. "Why, Fan, you are in
luck; it's real old Crown Derby!"

"Yes," said Fanny; "I thought it was. Whenever father does a thing he
does it well."

"We'll be almost afraid to drink out of it, Fanny!" exclaimed Julia
Bertram. "Fancy, if I were to drop one of those little jewels of cups!
Don't the colors just sparkle on them! Oh, if I were to drop it, and it
got broken, I don't think I'd ever hold up my head again!"

"Well, dear Julia, don't drop it," said Fanny, "and then you will feel
all right."

Cocoa was already prepared; the rich cake graced the center of the
board; the chocolate creams were certainly in evidence; and the girls
clustered round, laughing and talking. Fanny was determined to choke
back that feeling of uneasiness which had worried her during the whole
of that day. She could not tell the Specialities what her cousins had
done; she could not--she would not. There must be a secret between them.
She who belonged to a society of whom each member had to vow not to have
a secret from any other member, was about to break her vow.

The girls were in high spirits to-night, and in no mood to talk
"sobersides," as Mary Bertram sometimes called their graver discussions.

But when the little meal of cocoa and cake had come to an end, Margaret
said, "I want to make a proposal."

"Hush! hush! Let the oracle speak!" cried Olive, her pretty face beaming
with mirth.

"Oh Olive, don't be so ridiculous!" said Margaret. "You know perfectly
well I am no oracle; but I have a notion in my head. It is this: why
should not those splendid-looking girls, the Vivians, join the
Specialities? They did look rather funny, I will admit, yesterday; but
even then one could see that clothes matter little or nothing to them.
But now that they're dressed like the rest of us, they give distinction
to the whole school. I don't think I ever saw a face like Betty's. Fan,
you, of course, will second my proposal that Betty Vivian, even if her
sisters are too young, should be asked to become a Speciality?"

Fanny felt that she was turning very pale. Susie Rushworth gazed at her
in some wonder.

"I propose," exclaimed Margaret Grant, "that Miss Betty Vivian shall be
invited to join our society and to become a Speciality. I further
propose that we ask her to join our next meeting, which takes place this
day week, and is, by the way, held in my room. Now, who will second my
suggestion?"

"You will, of course, Fan," said Susie. "Betty is your cousin, so you
are the right person to second Margaret's wish."

Fanny's face grew yet paler. After a minute she said, "Just because
Betty is my cousin I would rather some one else seconded Margaret
Grant's proposal."

All the girls looked at her in astonishment.

"Very well; I second it," responded Susie.

"Girls," said Margaret, "will you all agree? Those who do _not_ agree,
please keep their hands down. Those who _do_ agree, please hold up
hands. Now, then, is Betty Vivian to be invited to join the
Specialities? Which has it--the 'ayes' or the 'noes'?"

All the girls' hands, with one exception, were eagerly raised in favor
of Betty Vivian. Fanny sat very still, her hands locked one inside the
other in her lap. Something in her attitude and in the expression of her
face caused each of her companions to gaze at her in extreme wonder.

"Why, Fanny, what is the meaning of this?" asked Margaret.

"I cannot explain myself," said Fanny.

"Cannot--and you a Speciality! Don't you know that we have no secrets
from one another?"

"That is true," said Fanny, speaking with a great effort. "Well, then,
I will explain myself. I would rather Betty Vivian did not join our
club."

"But why, dear--why?"

"Yes, Fanny, why?" echoed Susie.

"What ridiculous nonsense you are talking!" cried Olive Repton.

"The most striking-looking girl I ever saw!" said Julia Bertram. "Why,
Fan, what is your reason for this?"

"Call it jealousy if you like," said Fanny; "call it any name under the
sun, only don't worry me about it."

As she spoke she rose deliberately and left the room, her companions
looking after her in amazement.

"What does this mean?" said Julia.

"I can't understand it a bit," said Margaret. Then she added after a
pause, "I suppose, girls, you fully recognize that the Speciality Club
is supposed to be a club without prejudice or favor, and that, as the
'ayes' have carried the day, Miss Betty Vivian is to be invited to
join?"

"Of course she must be invited to join," replied Susie; "but it is very
unpleasant all the same. I cannot make out what can ail Fanny Crawford.
She hasn't been a bit herself since those girls arrived."

The Specialities chatted a little longer together, but the meeting was
not convivial. Fanny's absence prevented its being so; and very soon the
girls broke up, leaving the pretty cups and saucers and the remains of
the feast behind them. The chapel bell rang for prayers, and they all
trooped in. But Fanny Crawford was not present. This, in itself, was
almost without precedent, for girls were not allowed to miss prayers
without leave.

As each Speciality laid her head on her pillow that night she could not
but reflect on Fanny's strange behavior, and wondered much what it
meant. As to Fanny herself, she lay awake for hours. Some of the girls
and some of the mistresses thought that she was grieving for her father;
but, as a matter of fact, she was not even thinking of him. Every
thought of her mind was concentrated on what she called her present
dilemma. It was almost morning before the tired girl fell asleep.

At half-past six on the following day the great gong sounded through the
entire upper school. Betty started up in some amazement, her sisters in
some alarm.

By-and-by a kind-looking woman, dressed as a sort of housekeeper or
upper servant, entered the room. "Can I help you to dress, young
ladies?" she said.

The girls replied in the negative. They had always dressed themselves.

"Very well," replied the woman. "Then I will come to fetch you in
half-an-hour's time, so that you will be ready for prayers in chapel."

Perhaps Betty Vivian never, as long as she lived, forgot that first day
when she stood with her sisters in the beautiful little chapel and heard
the Reverend Edmund Fairfax read prayers. He was a delicate,
refined-looking man, with a very intellectual face and a beautiful
voice. Mrs. Haddo had begged of him to accept the post of private
chaplain to her great school for many reasons. First, because his health
was delicate; second, because she knew she could pay him well; and also,
for the greatest reason of all, because she was quite sure that Mr.
Fairfax could help her girls in moments of difficulty in their spiritual
life, should such moments arise.

Prayers came to an end; breakfast came to an end. The Vivians passed a
very brisk examination with some credit. As Miss Symes had predicted,
Betty was put into her special form, in which form Susie Rushworth and
Fanny Crawford also had their places. The younger Vivians were allowed
to remain in the upper school, but were in much lower forms. Betty took
to her work as happily (to use a well-known expression) as a duck takes
to water. Her eyes were bright with intelligence while she listened to
Miss Symes, who could teach so charmingly and could impart knowledge in
such an attractive way.

In the middle of the morning there was the usual brief period when the
girls might go out and amuse themselves for a short time. Betty wanted
to find her sisters; but before she could attempt to seek for them she
felt a hand laid on her arm, and, glancing round, saw that Fanny
Crawford was by her side.

"Betty," said Fanny, "I want to speak to you, and at once. We have only
a very few minutes; will you, please, listen?"

"Is it really important?" asked Betty. "For, if it is not, I do want to
say something to Sylvia. She forgot to give Dickie his raw meat this
morning."

"Oh, aren't you just hopeless!" exclaimed Fanny. "You think of that
terrible spider when--when----Oh, I don't know what to make of you!"

"And I don't know what to make of you, Fanny!" retorted Betty. "What are
you excited about? What is the matter?"

"Listen!--do listen!" said Fanny.

"Well, I am listening; but you really must be quick in getting out
whatever's troubling you."

"You have heard of the Specialities, haven't you?" said Fanny.

"Good gracious, no!" exclaimed Betty. "The Specialities--what are they?"

"There is nothing _what_ about them. They are people--girls; they are
not things."

"Oh, girls! What a funny name to give girls! I haven't heard of them,
Fanny."

"You won't be long at Haddo Court without hearing a great deal about
them," remarked Fanny. "I am one, and so is Susie Rushworth, and so are
the Bertrams, and so is that handsome girl Margaret Grant. You must
have noticed her; she is so dark and tall and stately. And so, also, is
dear little Olive Repton----"

"And so is--and so is--and so is--" laughed Betty, putting on her most
quizzical manner.

"You must listen to me. The Specialities--oh, they're not like any other
girls in the school, and it's the greatest honor in the world to be
asked to belong to them. Betty, it's this way. Margaret Grant is the
sort of captain of the club--I don't know how to express it exactly; but
she is our head, our chief--and she has taken a fancy to you; and last
night we had a meeting in my bedroom----"

"Oh, that was what the row was about!" exclaimed Betty. "If we hadn't
been hearty sleepers and girls straight from the Scotch moors, you would
have given us a very bad night."

"Never mind about that. Margaret Grant proposed last night that you
should be asked to join."

"_I_ asked to join?"

"Yes, you, Betty. Doesn't it sound absurd? And they all voted for
you--every one of them, with the exception of myself."

"And it's a great honor, isn't it?" said Betty, speaking very quietly.

"Oh yes--immense."

"Then, of course, you wouldn't vote--would you, dear little Fan?"

"Don't talk like that! We shall be returning to the schoolroom in a few
minutes, and Margaret is sure to talk to you after dinner. You are
elected by the majority, and you are to be invited to attend the next
meeting. But I want you to refuse--yes, I do, Betty; for you can't
join--you know you can't. With that awful, awful lie on your conscience,
you can't be a Speciality. I shall go wild with misery if you join.
Betty, you must say you won't."

Betty looked very scornfully at Fanny. "There are some people in the
world," she said, "who make me feel very wicked, and I am greatly
afraid you are one. Now, let me tell you plainly and frankly that if you
had said nothing I should probably not have wished to become that
extraordinary thing, a Speciality; but because you are in such a mortal
funk I shall join your club with the utmost pleasure. So now you know."




CHAPTER VII

SCOTCH HEATHER


Betty was true to her word. After school that day, Margaret Grant and
Olive Repton came up to her and asked her in a very pretty manner if she
would become a member of their Speciality Club.

"Of course," said Margaret, "you don't know anything about us or our
rules at present; but we think we should like you to join, so we are
here now to invite you to come to our next meeting, which will take
place on Thursday of next week, at eight o'clock precisely, in my
bedroom."

"I don't know where your bedroom is," said Betty.

"But I know where yours is!" exclaimed Olive; "so I will fetch you,
Betty, and bring you to Margaret's room. Oh, I am sure you will enjoy
it--we have such fun! Sometimes we give quite big entertainments--that
is, when we invite the other girls, which we do once or twice during the
term. By the way, that reminds me that you will be most useful in that
respect, for you and your sisters have the largest bedroom in the house.
You will, of course, lend us your room when your turn comes; but that is
a long way off."

"I am so glad you are coming!" said Margaret. "You are the sort of girl
we want in our club. And now, please, tell me about your life in
Scotland."

"I will with pleasure," replied Betty. She looked full up into
Margaret's face as she spoke.

Margaret was older than Betty, and taller; and there was something about
her which commanded universal respect.

"I don't mind telling you," said Betty--"nor you," she added as Olive's
dancing blue eyes met hers; "for a kind of intuition tells me that you
would both love my wild moors and my beautiful heather. Oh, I say, do
come, both of you, and see our three little plots of garden! There's
Sylvia's plot, and Hester's, and mine; and we have a plant of heather,
straight from Craigie Muir, in the midst of each. Our gardens are quite
bare except for that tiny plant. Do, _do_ come and see it!"

Margaret laughed.

Olive said, "Oh, what fun!" and the three began to walk quickly under
the trees in the direction of the Vivians' gardens.

As they passed under the great oak-trees Betty looked up, and her eyes
danced with fun. "Are you good at climbing trees?" she asked of
Margaret.

"I used to be when I was very, very young; but those days are over."

"There are a few very little girls in the lower school who still climb
one of the safest trees," remarked Olive.

Betty's eyes continued to dance. "You give me delightful news," she
said. "I am so truly glad none of you do anything so vulgar as to climb
trees."

"But why, Betty?" asked Margaret.

"I have my own reasons," replied Betty. "You can't expect me to tell you
everything right away, can you?"

"You must please yourself," said Margaret.

Olive looked at Betty in a puzzled manner; and the three girls were
silent, only that they quickened their steps, crunching down some broken
twigs as they walked.

By-and-by they reached the three bare patches of ground, which were
railed in in the simple manner which Mrs. Haddo had indicated, and in
the center of which stood the wooden post with the words, "THE VIVIANS'
PRIVATE GARDENS," painted on it.

"How very funny!" exclaimed Olive.

"Yes, it is rather funny," remarked Betty. "Did you ever in the whole
course of your existence see anything uglier than these three patches of
ground? There is nothing whatever planted in them except our darling
Scotch heather; and oh, by the way, I don't believe the precious little
plants are thriving! They are drooping like anything! Oh dear! oh dear!
I think I shall die if they die!" As she spoke she flung herself on the
ground, near the path.

"Of course you won't, Betty," said Margaret. "Besides, why should they
die? They only want watering."

"I'll run and fetch a canful of water," said Olive, who was extremely
good-natured.

Betty made no response. She was still lying on the ground, resting on
her elbows, while her hands tenderly touched the faded and drooping
bells of the wild heather. She had entered her own special plot. Olive
had disappeared to fetch the water, but Margaret still stood by Betty's
side.

"Do you think they'll do?" said Betty at last, glancing at her
companion.

Margaret noticed that her eyes were full of tears. "I don't think they
will," she said after a pause. "But I'll tell you what we must do,
Betty: we must get the right sort of soil for them--just the sandy soil
they want. We'll go and consult Birchall; he is the oldest gardener in
the place, and knows something about everything. For that matter, we are
sure to get the sort of sand we require on this piece of waste
ground--our 'forest primeval,' as Olive calls it."

"Oh dear!" said Betty, dashing away the tears from her eyes, "you are
funny when you talk of a thing like that"--she waved her hand in the
direction of the uncultivated land--"as a 'forest primeval.' It is the
poorest, shabbiest bit of waste land I ever saw in my life."

"Let's walk across it," said Margaret. "Olive can't be back for a minute
or two."

"Why should we walk across it?"

"I want to show you where some heather grows. It is certainly not rich,
nor deep in color, nor beautiful, like yours; but it has grown in that
particular spot for two or three years. I am quite sure that Birchall
will say that the soil round that heather is the right sort of earth to
plant your Scotch heather in."

"Well, come, and let's be very quick," said Betty.

The girls walked across the bit of common. Margaret pointed out the
heather, which was certainly scanty and poor.

Betty looked at it with scorn. "I think," she said after a pause, "I
don't want to consult Birchall." Then she added after another pause, "I
think, on the whole, I'd much rather have no heather than plants like
those. You are very kind, Margaret; but there are some things that can't
be transplanted, just as there are some hearts--that break--yes,
break--if you take them from home. That poor heather--once, doubtless,
it was very flourishing; it is evidently dying now of a sort of
consumption. Let's come back to our plots of ground, please, Margaret."

They did so, and were there greeted by Olive, who had a large can of
cold water standing by her side, and was eagerly talking to Sylvia and
Hester. Betty marched first into the center plot of ground.

"I've got lots of water," said Olive in a cheerful tone, "so we'll do
the watering at once. Sylvia and Hester say that they must have a third
each of this canful; but of course we can get a second can if we want
it."

"No!" said Betty.

Sylvia, who was gazing with lack-lustre eyes at the fading heather, now
started and looked full at her sister. Hester, who always clung to
Sylvia in moments of emotion, caught her sister's hand and held it very
tight.

"No," said Betty again; "I have made a discovery. Scotch heather does
not grow here in this airless sort of place. Sylvia and Hester, Margaret
was good enough to show me what she calls heather. There are a few
straggling plants just at the other side of that bit of common. I don't
want ours to die slowly. Our plants shall go at once. No, we don't water
them. Sylvia, go into your garden and pull up the plant; and, Hester,
you do likewise Go, girls; go at once!"

"But, Betty----" said Margaret.

"You had better not cross her now," said Sylvia.

Margaret started when Sylvia addressed her in this tone.

Betty's face was painfully white, except where two spots of color blazed
in each cheek. As her sisters stooped obediently to pull up their
heather, Betty bent and wrenched hers from the ground by which it was
surrounded, which ground was already dry and hard. "Let's make a
bonfire," she said. "I sometimes think," she added, "that in each little
bell of heather there lives the wee-est of all the fairies; and perhaps,
if we burn this poor, dear thing, the little, wee fairies may go back to
their ain countree."

"It all seems quite dreadful to me," said Margaret.

"It is right," replied Betty; "and I have a box of matches in my
pocket."

"Oh, have you?" exclaimed Olive. "If--if Mrs. Haddo knew----"

But Betty made no response. She set her sisters to collect some dry
leaves and bits of broken twigs; and presently the bonfire was erected
and kindled, and the poor heather from the north country had ceased to
exist.

"Now, you must see _our_ gardens," said Margaret, "for you must have
gardens, you know. Olive and I will show you the sort of things that
grow in the south, that flourish here, and look beautiful."

"I cannot see them now," replied Betty. She brushed past Margaret, and
walked rapidly across the common.

Sylvia's face turned very white, and she clutched Hetty's hand still
more tightly.

"What is she going to do? What is the matter?" said Margaret, turning to
the twins.

"She can't help it," said Sylvia; "she must do it. She is going to
howl."

"To do what?" said Margaret Grant.

"Howl. Did you never howl? Well, perhaps you never did. Anyhow, she must
get away as far as possible before she begins, and we had better go back
to the house. You wouldn't like the sound of Betty's howling."

"But are you going to let her howl, as you call it, alone?"

"Let her? We have no voice in the matter," replied Hester. "Betty always
does exactly what she likes. Let's go quickly; let's get away. It's the
best thing she can do. She's been keeping in that howling-fit for over a
week, and it must find vent. She'll be all right when you see her next.
But don't, on any account, ever again mention the heather that we
brought from Craigie Muir. She may get over its death some day, but not
yet."

"Your sister is a very strange girl," said Margaret.

"Every one says that," replied Sylvia. "Don't they, Het?"

"Yes; we're quite tired of hearing it," said Hetty. "But do let's come
quickly. Which is the farthest-off part of the grounds--the place where
we are quite certain not to hear?"

"You make me feel almost nervous," said Margaret. "But come along, if
you wish to."

The four girls walked rapidly. At last they found a little summer-house
which was built high up on the very top of a rising mound. From here you
could get a good view of the surrounding country; and very beautiful it
was--at least, for those whose eyes were trained to observe the rich
beauty of cultivated land, of flowing rivers, of forests, of carefully
kept trees. Very lonely indeed was the scene from Haddo Court
summer-house; for, in addition to every scrap of land being made to
yield its abundance, there were pretty cottages dotted here and
there--each cottage possessing its own gay flower-garden, and, in most
cases, its own happy little band of pretty boys and girls.

As soon as the four girls found themselves in the summer-house, Margaret
began to praise the view to Sylvia.

Sylvia looked round to right and to left. "_We_ don't admire that sort
of thing," she said. "Do we, Hetty?"

Hetty shook her head with vehemence. "Oh no, no," she said. Then, coming
a little closer to Margaret, she looked into her face and continued,
"Are you the sort of kind girl who will keep a secret?"

Margaret thought of the Speciality Club. But surely this poor little
secret belonging solely to the Vivians need not be related to any one
who was not in sympathy with them. "I never tell tales, if that is what
you mean," she said.

"Then that is all right," remarked Sylvia. "And are you the same sort of
girl, Olive? You look very kind."

"It wouldn't be hard to be kind to one like you," was Olive's response.

Whereupon Sylvia smiled, and Hetty came close to Olive and looked into
her face.

"Then we want you," continued Sylvia, "never, never to tell about the
burnt sacrifice of the Scotch heather, nor about the flight of the
fairies back to Scotland. It tortured Betty to have to do it; but she
thought it right, therefore it was done. There are some people,
however, who would not understand her; and we would much rather be able
to tell our own Betty that you will never speak of it, when she has come
back to herself and has got over her howling."

"Of course we'll never tell," said Olive; and Margaret nodded her head
without speaking.

"I think you are just awfully nice," said Sylvia. "We were so terrified
when we came to this school. We thought we'd have an awful time. We
still speak of it as a prison, you know. Do you speak of it to your
dearest friend as a prison?"

"Prison!" said Margaret. "There isn't a place in the world I love as I
love Haddo Court."

"Then you never, never lived in a dear little gray stone house on a wild
Scotch moor; and you never had a man like Donald Macfarlane to talk to,
nor a woman like Jean Macfarlane to make scones for you; and you never
had dogs like our dogs up there, nor a horse like David. I pity you from
my heart!"

"I never had any of those things," said Margaret; "but I shall like to
hear about them from you."

"And so shall I like to hear about them," said Olive.

"We will tell you, if Betty gives us leave," said one of the twins. "We
never do anything without Betty's leave. She is the person we look up
to, and obey, and follow. We'd follow her to the world's end; we'd die
for her, both of us, if it would do her any good."

Margaret took Sylvia's hand and began to smooth it softly. "I wish," she
said then in a slow voice, "that I had friends to love me as you love
your sister."

"Perhaps you aren't worthy," said Sylvia. "There is no one living like
Betty in all the world, and we feel about her as we do because she is
Betty."

"But, all the same," said Hester, frowning as she spoke, "our Betty has
got an enemy."

"An enemy, my dear child! What do you mean? You have just been praising
her so much! Did any one take a dislike to her up in that north
country?"

"It may have begun there," remarked Hetty; "but the sad and dreadful
thing is that the enemy is in this house. Sylvia and I don't mind your
knowing. We rather think you like her, but we don't. Her name is Fanny
Crawford."

"Oh, really, though, that is quite nonsense!" said Margaret, flushing
with annoyance. "Poor dear Fanny, there is not a better or sweeter girl
in the school!"

Sylvia laughed. "That is your point of view," she said. "She is our
enemy; she is not yours. Oh, hurrah! hurrah! I see Betty! She is coming
back, walking very slowly. She has got over the worst of the howls. We
must both go and meet her. Don't be anywhere about, please, either of
you. Keep quite in the shade, so that she won't see you; and the next
time you meet talk to her as though this had never happened."

The twins dashed out of sight. They certainly could run very fast.

When they had gone Margaret looked at Olive. "Well," she said, "that
sort of scene rather takes one's breath away. What do you think, Olive?"

"It was exceedingly trying," said Olive.

"All the same," said Margaret, "I feel roused up about those girls in
the most extraordinary manner. Didn't you notice, too, what Sylvia said
about poor Fanny? Isn't it horrid?"

"Of course it isn't true," was Olive's remark.

"We have made up our minds not to speak evil of any one in the school,"
said Margaret after a pause; "but I cannot help remembering that Fanny
did not wish Betty to become a Speciality. And don't you recall how
angry she was, and how she would not vote with the 'ayes,' and would
not give any reason, and although she was hostess she walked out of the
room?"

"It's very uncomfortable altogether," said Olive. "But I don't see that
we can do anything."

"Well, perhaps not yet," said Margaret; "but I may as well say at once,
Olive, that I mean to take up those girls. Until to-day I was only
interested in Betty, but now I am interested in all three; and if I can,
without making mischief, I must get to the bottom of what is making poor
little Betty so bitter, and what is upsetting the equanimity of our dear
old Fan, whom we have always loved so dearly."

Just at that moment Fanny Crawford herself and Susie Rushworth appeared,
walking together arm in arm. They saw Margaret and Olive, and came to
join them. Susie was in her usual high spirits, and Fanny looked quite
calm and collected. There was not even an allusion made to the Vivian
girls. Margaret was most thankful, for she certainly did not wish the
little episode she had witnessed to reach any one's ears but her own and
Olive's. Susie was talking eagerly about a great picnic which Mrs. Haddo
had arranged for the following Saturday. The whole school, both upper
and lower, were to go. Mr. Fairfax and his wife, most of the teachers,
and Mrs. Haddo herself would also accompany the girls. They were all
going to a place about twenty miles away; and Mrs. Haddo, who kept two
motor-cars of her own, had made arrangements for the hire of several
more, so that the party could quickly reach their place of rendezvous
and thus have a longer time there to enjoy themselves.

"She does things so well, doesn't she?" said Susie. "There never was her
like. Do you know, there was a sort of insurrection in the lower school
early this morning, for naughty sprites had whispered that all the small
children were to go in ordinary carriages and dogcarts and wagonettes.
Then came the news that Mrs. Haddo meant each girl in the school to
have an equal share of enjoyment; and, lo and behold! the cloud has
vanished, and the little ones are making even merrier than the older
girls."

"I wish I felt as amiable as I used to feel," said Fanny at that moment.

"Oh, but, Fan, why don't you?" asked Olive. "You ought to feel more and
more amiable every day--that is, if training means anything."

"Training is all very well," answered Fanny, "and you may think you are
all right; but when temptation comes----"

"Temptation!" said Margaret. "In my opinion, that is the worst of Haddo
Court: we are so shielded, and treated with such extreme kindness, that
temptation cannot come."

"Then you wish to be tested, do you, Margaret?" asked Fanny.

Margaret shivered slightly. "Sometimes I do wish it," she said.

"Oh, Margaret dear, don't!" said Olive. "You'll have heaps of troubles
in life, for my mother says that no one yet was exempt from them. There
never was a woman quite like my darling mother--except, indeed, Mrs.
Haddo. Mother has quite peculiar ideas with regard to bringing up girls.
She says the aim of her life is to give me a very happy childhood and
early youth. She thinks that such a life will make me all the stronger
to withstand temptation."

"Let us hope so, anyhow," said Fanny. Then she added, "Don't suppose I
am grumbling, although it has been a trial father going away--so very
far away--to India. But I think the real temptation comes to us in this
way: when we have to meet girls we can't tolerate."

"Now she's going to say something dreadful!" thought Olive to herself.

Margaret rose as though she would put an end to the colloquy.

Fanny was watching Margaret's face. "The girl I am specially thinking of
now," she said, "is Sibyl Ray."

"Oh!" said Margaret. She gave a sigh of such undoubted relief that Fanny
was certain she had guessed what her first thoughts were.

"And now I will tell you why I don't like Sibyl," Fanny continued. "I
have nothing whatever to say against her. I have never heard of her
doing anything underhand or what we might call low-down or ill-bred. At
the same time, I do dislike Sibyl, just for the simple reason that she
is _not_ well-bred, and she never will be."

"Oh! oh, give her her chance--do!" said Olive.

"I am not going to interfere with her," remarked Fanny; "but she can
never be a friend of mine. There are some girls who like her very well.
There's Martha West, who is constantly with her."

"I am quite sure," said Margaret, "that there isn't a better girl in the
school than Martha, and I have serious thoughts of asking her to become
a Speciality." As she spoke she fixed her very dark eyes on Fanny's
face.

"Do ask her; I shall be delighted," remarked Fanny. "Only, whatever you
do, don't ask her friend, Sibyl Ray."

"I have no present intention of doing so. Fanny, I don't want to be
nasty; but you are quite right about Sibyl. No one can say a word
against her; and yet she just is not well-bred."




CHAPTER VIII

A NEW MEMBER


The picnic was a great success. The day was splendid. The sun shone in a
sky which was almost cloudless. The motor-cars were all in prime
condition. There were no accidents of any sort. The girls laughed and
chatted, and enjoyed life to the utmost; and the Vivian girls were
amongst the merriest in those large and varied groups.

The twins invariably followed in Betty's footsteps, and Betty possessed
that curious mixture of temperament which threw her into the depths of
anguish one moment and sent her spirits flying like a rocket skyward the
next. Betty's spirits were tending skyward on this happy day. She was
also making friends in the school, and was delighted to walk with
Margaret and Susie and Olive. Fanny did not trouble her at all; but
Martha West chatted with her for a whole long hour, and, as Martha knew
Scotland, a very strong link was immediately established between the
girls.

A thoroughly happy picnic--a perfect one--is usually lived through
without adventure. There are no _contretemps_, no unhappy moments, no
jealousies, no heart-burnings. These are the sort of picnics which come
to us very rarely in life, but they do come now and then. In one sense,
however, they are uninteresting, for they have no history--there is
little or nothing to say about them. Other picnics are to follow in this
story which ended differently, which led to tangled knots and bitter
heart-burnings. But the first picnics from Haddo Court in which Betty
Vivian took part was, in a way, something like that first morning when
she joined the other girls in whispering her prayers in the beautiful
chapel.

The picnic came and went, and in course of time the day arrived when
Betty was to be the honored guest of the Specialities. On the morning of
that day Fanny made another effort to induce Betty to renounce the idea
of becoming a Speciality. She had spent a sleepless night thinking over
the matter, and by the morning had made up her mind what to do.

Betty was making friends rapidly in the school. But the twins, although
they were quite popular, still clung very much to each other; and
Fanny's idea was to get at Betty through her sisters. She knew quite
well that often, during recess, Sylvia and Hester rushed upstairs, for
what purpose she could not ascertain, the existence of the Vivians'
attic being unknown to her. There, however, day by day, Sylvia and Hetty
fed Dickie on raw meat, and watched the monstrous spider getting larger
and more ferocious-looking.

"He'd be the sort," said Sylvia, opening her eyes very wide and fixing
them on her sister, "to do mischief to _some one_ if _some one_ were not
very careful."

"Oh, don't, silly Sylvia!" said Hetty with some annoyance. "You know
Mrs. Haddo would not like you to talk like that. Now let's examine our
caterpillars."

"There isn't much to see at the present moment," remarked Sylvia, "for
they're every one of them in the chrysalis stage."

The girls, having spent about five minutes in the Vivians' attics, now
ran downstairs, and went out, as was their custom, by a side-door which
opened into one of the gardens. It was here that Fanny pounced on them.
She came quickly forward, trying to look as pleasant as she could.

"Well, twins," she said, "and how goes the world with you?"

"Oh, all right!" replied Sylvia. "We can't stay to talk now; can we,
Het? We've got to meet a friend of ours in the lower garden--old
Birchall. By the way, do you know old Birchall, Fan?"

"Doddering old creature! of course I know him," replied Fanny.

"He isn't doddering," said Sylvia; "he has a great deal more sense than
most of us. I wish I had half his knowledge of worms, and spiders, and
ants, and goldfish, and--and--flies of every sort. Why, there isn't a
thing he doesn't know about them. I call him one of the most delightful
old men I ever met."

"Oh," said Hetty, "you shouldn't say that, Sylvia! Birchall is nice, but
he isn't a patch upon Donald Macfarlane."

"If you want to see Birchall, I will walk with you," said Fanny. "You
can't object to my doing that, can you?"

"We mean to run," said Hetty.

"Oh no, you don't!" said Fanny. Here she took Hetty's hand, pulled it
violently through her arm. "You've got to talk to me, both of you. I
have something important I want to say."

Sylvia laughed.

"Why do you laugh, you naughty, rude little girl?"

"Oh, please forgive me, Fanny; but it does sound so silly for you to say
that you have something important to talk over with us, for of course we
know perfectly well that you have nothing of the sort."

"Then you are wrong, that's all; and I sha'n't waste time arguing with
you."

"That's all right," said Hetty. "We may be off to Birchall now, mayn't
we, Fanny?"

"No, you mayn't. You must take a message from me to Betty."

"I thought so," remarked Sylvia.

Fanny had great difficulty in controlling her temper. After a minute she
said, speaking quietly, "I don't permit myself to lower myself by
arguing with children like you two. But I have an important message to
give your sister, and if you won't give it you clearly understand that
you will rue it to the last days of your lives--yes, to the last day of
your lives."

Sylvia began to dance. Hetty tried to tug her hand away from Fanny's
arm.

"Come, children, you can do it or not, just as you please. Tell Betty
that if she is wise, and does not wish to get into a most serious and
disgraceful scrape, she will not attend the meeting of some girls in
Margaret Grant's room this evening."

"Let's try if we know it exactly right," said Sylvia. "Betty will get
into a serious scrape if she goes to Margaret Grant's room to-night?
What a pity! For, you see, Fan, she is going."

"Do listen to me, Sylvia. You have more sense in your little head than
you imagine. Persuade Betty not to go. Believe me, I am only acting for
her best interests."

"We'll give her the message all right," said Hester. "But as to
persuading Betty when Betty's mind is made up, I'd like to know who can
persuade her to change it then."

"But you are her sisters; she will do what you wish."

"But we _don't_ wish her not to go. We'd much rather she went. Why
shouldn't she have a bit of fun? Some one told us--I forget now who it
was--that there are always splendid chocolates at those funny
bedroom-parties. I only wish we were asked!"

"I tell you that your sister will get into a scrape!" repeated Fanny.

"You tell us so indeed," said Sylvia, "and it's most frightfully
annoying of you; for we sha'n't have a minute to talk to Birchall, and
he promised to have four different kinds of worms ready for us to look
at this morning. Oh dear, dear! mayn't we go? Fanny, if you are so fond
of Betty, why don't you speak to her yourself?"

"I have spoken, and she won't listen to me."

"There! wasn't I right?" said Sylvia. "Oh Fanny, do you think she'd mind
what we said--and coming from you, too? If she didn't listen to you
direct, she certainly won't listen to you crookedwise--that's not
Betty."

"I was thinking," said Fanny, "that you might persuade her--that is, if
you are very, very clever, just from yourselves--not to go. You needn't
mention my name at all; and if you really manage this, I can tell you
I'll do a wonderful lot for you. I'll get father to send me curious
spiders and other creatures, all the way from India, for you. He can if
he likes. I will write to him by the very next mail."

"Bribes! bribes!" cried Sylvia. "No, Fan, we can't be bribed. Good-bye,
Fan. We'll give the message, but she'll go all the same."

With a sudden spring, for which Fanny was not prepared, Hester loosened
her hand from Fanny's arm. The next minute she had caught Sylvia's hand,
and the two were speeding away in the direction of the lower garden and
the fascinating company of old Birchall.

Fanny could have stamped her foot with rage.

The Specialities always met at eight o'clock in the evening. They were
expected to wear their pretty evening-dress, and look as much like
grown-up young ladies as possible. In a great house like Haddo Court
there must be all sorts of rooms, some much bigger than others. Thus,
where every room was nice and comfortable, there were a few quite
charming. The Vivians had one of the largest rooms, but Margaret Grant
had the most beautiful. She had been for long years now in the school,
and was therefore accorded many privileges. She had come to Haddo Court
as a very little girl, and had worked her way steadily from the lower
school to the upper. Her people were exceedingly well-off, and her
beautiful room--half bedroom, half sitting-room--was furnished mostly
out of her own pocket-money. She took great pride in its arrangements,
and on this special evening it looked more attractive than usual. There
were great vases of late roses and early chrysanthemums on the different
whatnots and small tables. A very cheerful fire blazed in the grate,
for it was getting cold enough now to enjoy a fire in the evenings, and
Margaret's supper was all that was tasteful and elegant.

Betty had received Fanny Crawford's message, and Betty's eyes had
sparkled with suppressed fun when her sisters had delivered it to her.
She had made no comment of any sort, but had asked the girls, before
they got into bed, to help her to fasten on her very prettiest frock.
She had not worn this frock before, and the simple, soft, white muslin
suited her young face and figure as nothing else could have done. The
black ribbon which tied back her thick hair, and was worn in memory of
dear Aunt Frances, was also becoming to her; and the twin girls' eyes
sparkled with rapture as they looked at their darling.

"Good-night, Bet!" said Sylvia.

"Have a splendid time, Bet!" whispered Hester.

Then Sylvia said, "I am glad you are going!"

"But of course I am going," said Betty. "Good-night, chickabiddies;
good-night. I won't wake you when I come back. Sleep well!" Betty left
the room.

In the corridor outside she met Olive Repton, who said, "Oh, there you
are, Betty! Now let's come. We'll be two of the first; but that's all
the better, seeing that you are a new member."

"It sounds so mysterious--a sort of freemasonry," remarked Betty,
laughing as she spoke. "I never did think that exciting things of this
sort happened at school."

"They don't at most schools," replied Olive. "But, then, there is only
one Haddo Court in the world."

"Shall I have to take an awful vow; shall I have to write my name in
blood in a queer sort of book, or anything of that sort?" asked Betty.

"No, no! You are talking nonsense now."

By this time they had reached Margaret's room, and Margaret was waiting
for them. Betty gave a cry of rapture when she saw the flowers, and,
going from one glass bowl to the other, she buried her face in the
delicious perfume.

By-and-by the rest of the Specialities appeared--the Bertrams (who were
greatly excited at the thought of Betty joining), Susie Rushworth, and,
last to enter, Fanny Crawford.

Fanny had taken great pains with her dress, and she looked her best on
this occasion. She gave one quick glance at Betty. Then she went up to
her and said, "Welcome, Betty!" and held out her hand.

Betty was not prepared for this most friendly greeting. She scarcely
touched Fanny's hand, however, and by so doing put herself slightly in
the wrong in the presence of the girls, who were watching her; while
Fanny, far cleverer in these matters, put herself in the right.

"Now, then, we must all have supper," said Margaret. "After that we'll
explain the rules to Betty, and she can decide whether she will join us
or not. Then we can be as jolly as we please. It is our custom, you
know, girls, to be extra jolly when a new member joins the
Specialities."

"I'm game for all the fun in the world," said Betty. Her curious, eager,
beautiful eyes were fixed on Margaret's face; and Margaret again felt
that strange sense of being wonderfully drawn to her, and yet at the
same time of being annoyed. What did Fanny's conduct mean? But one girl,
however much she may wish to do so, cannot quite spoil the fun of six
others. Margaret, therefore, was prepared to be as amiable and merry and
gay as possible.

Was there ever a more delicious supper? Did ever cake taste quite so
nice? Were chocolate creams and Turkish delight ever quite so good? And
was not Margaret's lemonade even more admirable than her delicate cups
of cocoa? And were not the dried fruits which were presently handed
round quite wonderful in flavor? And, above all things, were not the
sandwiches which Margaret had provided as a sort of surprise (for as a
rule they had no sandwiches at these gatherings) the greatest success of
all?

The merry supper came to an end, and the girls now clustered in a wide
circle round the fire; and Margaret, as president, took the book of
rules and began to read aloud.

"There are," she said, opening the book, which was bound beautifully in
white vellum, "certain rules which each member receives a copy of, and
which she takes to heart and obeys. If she deliberately breaks any
single one of these rules, and such a lapse of principle is discovered,
she is expected to withdraw from the Specialities. This club was first
set on foot by a girl who has long left the school, and who was very
much loved when she was here. Up to the present it has been a success,
although its numbers have varied according to the tone of the girls who
belong to the upper school. No girl belonging to the lower school has
ever yet been asked to join. We have had at one time in the Speciality
Club as many as one dozen members. At present we are six; although we
hope that if you, Betty, decide to join us, we shall have seven members.
That will be very nice," continued Margaret, smiling and looking across
the room at Betty, whose eyes were fixed on her face, "for seven is the
mystic, the perfect number. Now, I will begin to read the rules aloud to
you. If you decide to think matters over, we will ask you to come to our
next gathering this day week, when you will receive the badge of
membership, and a copy of the rules would be made by me and sent to you
to your room.

"Now I will begin by telling you that the great object of our club is to
encourage the higher thought. Its object is to discourage and, if
possible, put a stop to low, small, mean, foolish, uncharitable
thoughts. Its object is to set kindness before each member as the best
thing in life. You can judge for yourself, Betty, that we aim high.
Yes, what were you going to say?"

"I was thinking," said Betty, whose eyes were now very wide open indeed,
while her cheeks grew paler than ever with some concealed emotion, "that
the girl who first thought of this club must have sat on a Scotch moor
one day, with the purple heather all round her, and that to her it was
vouchsafed to hear the fairies speak when they rang the little purple
bells of the heather."

"That may have been the case, dear," said Margaret in her kindest tone.
"Now, I will read you the rules. They are quite short and to the point:

     "'RULE I.--Each girl who is a member of the Specialities gives
     perfect confidence to her fellow-members, keeps no secret to
     herself which those members ought to know, is ready to consider
     each member as though she were her own sister, to help her in time
     of trouble, and to rejoice with her in periods of joy.'

"That is Rule I., and I need not say, Betty, that it is a very important
rule."

Betty's eyes were now lowered, so that only her very black lashes were
seen as they rested against her pale cheeks.

"Rule II. is this:

     "'RULE II.--That the Specialities read each day, for one quarter of
     an hour, a book of great thoughts.'

"The books are generally selected at the beginning of term, and each
member is expected to read the same amount and from the same book. This
term, for instance, we occupy one quarter of an hour daily in reading
Jeremy Taylor's 'Holy Living.' It is not very long, but there's a vast
amount of thought in it. If we feel puzzled about anything in this
wonderful book we discuss it with each other at the next meeting of the
Specialities, and if, after such a discussion, the whole matter does not
seem quite clear, we ask Mr. Fairfax to help us. He is most kind,
although of course he is not in the secret of our club.

"Rule III. is quite different. It is this:

     "'RULE III.--Each day we give ourselves up, every one of us, to
     real, genuine fun--to having what may be called a jolly time.'

"We never miss this part of the Speciality life. We get our fun either
by chatting gaily to each other, or by enjoying the society of a
favorite schoolfellow.

"Rule IV. does not come into every day life; nevertheless it is
important:

     "'RULE IV.--We meet once a week in one of our bedrooms; but four
     times during the term we all subscribe together, and get up as big
     a party as ever we can of girls who are not Specialities. These
     girls have supper with us, and afterwards we have round games or
     music or anything that gives us pleasure.'

"Rule V. is this:

     "'RULE V.--That whoever else we are cross with, we are always very
     careful to show respect to our teachers, and, if possible, to love
     them. We also try to shut our eyes to their faults, even if we see
     them.'

"Rule VI. is perhaps the most difficult of all to follow completely. It
is the old, old rule, Betty Vivian, of forgetting ourselves and living
for others. It is a rule that makes the secret of happiness. It is
impossible to keep it in its fullness in this world; but our aim is to
have a good try for it, and I think, on the whole, we succeed.

"Now, these are the six rules. When you read them over, you will see
that they are comprehensive, that they mean a vast lot. They are, every
one of them, rules which tend to discipline--the sort of discipline that
will help us when we leave the school and enter into the big school of
the world. Betty, do you feel inclined to join the club or not?"

"I don't know," replied Betty. "It is impossible to answer your
question on the spur of the moment. But I should greatly like to see a
copy of the rules."

"I will have them copied and sent to your bedroom, Betty. Then if you
decide to join, you will be admitted formally this day week, and will
receive the badge of the Specialities--a little true-lovers' knot made
of silver--which you will wear when the Specialities give their
entertainments, and which will remind you that we are bound together in
one sisterhood of love for our fellow-creatures."

Betty got up somewhat nervously. "I must think a great deal; and if I
may come to whichever room the Specialities are to meet in this day
week, I will let you know what I have decided."

"Very well, dear," said Margaret, shutting the book and completely
altering her tone. "That is all, I think to-night. Now, you must sit
down and enjoy yourself. Which girl would you like to sit close to? We
are going to have some round games, and they are quite amusing."

"I should like to sit close to you, Margaret, if I may."

"You certainly may, Betty; and there is a seat near mine, just by that
large bowl of white chrysanthemums."

Betty took the seat; and now all the girls began to chat, each of them
talking lovingly and kindly to the other. There was a tone about their
conversation which was as different from the way they spoke in their
ordinary life as though they were girls in a nunnery who had made solemn
vows to forsake the world. Even Fanny's face looked wonderfully kind and
softened. She did not even glance at Betty; but Betty looked at her once
or twice, and was astonished at the expression that Fanny wore.

"Just one minute, girls, before we begin our fun," said Margaret.
"Martha West is most anxious to join the Specialities. Betty, of course,
has no vote, as she is not yet a member. But the rest of us know Martha
well, and I think we would all like her to join. Those who are opposed
to her, will they keep down their hands? Those who wish for her as a
member, will they hold them up?"

All hands were held up on this occasion, and Fanny held hers the
straightest and highest of all.

"Three cheers for Martha West!" said Susie Rushworth.

"It will be splendid to have Martha!" said both the Bertrams; while
Olive, always gay, spirited, and full of fun, laughed from sheer
delight.

The usual formula was then gone through, and Fanny Crawford was deputed
to take a note to Martha inviting her to be present at the next meeting.

"Now, we shall have about half an hour for different sorts of fun," said
Margaret. "By the way, Betty," she continued, "sometimes our meetings
are rather solemn affairs; we want to discuss the book we are reading,
or something has happened that we wish to talk over. On the other hand,
there are times when we have nothing but fun and frolic. We're not a bit
solemn on these occasions; we loosen all the tension, so to speak, and
enjoy ourselves to the utmost."

"And there are times, also," said Olive, "when we are just as busy as
bees planning out our next entertainment. Oh Margaret, we can't have one
this day week because of Betty and Martha. But don't you think we might
have one this day three weeks? And don't you think it might be a very
grand affair? And supposing Betty becomes a member--which, of course,
you will, Betty, for you couldn't disappoint us now--supposing we have
it in Betty's palatial mansion of a bedroom! We can ask no end of girls
to that. Oh, won't it be fun?"

"If you ask my sisters, I don't mind at all--that is, _if_ I am a
member," said Betty.

"Of course we'll ask the dear twins," said Margaret. She took Betty's
hand as she spoke and squeezed it with sudden affection.

Betty pressed a little nearer to her. It was worth even giving up the
Scotch moors, and the society of Donald and Jean, and the dogs and the
horse, to have such a friend as Margaret Grant.

But now the fun began in earnest, and very good fun it was; for every
girl had a considerable sense of humor, so much so that their games were
carried on with great spirit. Their laughter was so merry as to be quite
infectious; and no one was more amazed than Betty herself when the
ordeal of this first visit to the Specialities was over and she was
walking quickly downstairs, with Olive by her side, on her way to the
chapel.

How beautifully Mr. Fairfax read the evening prayers that night! How
lovely it was to listen to his melodious voice and to look at his
earnest, intelligent face! How sweet, how wonderful, was the soft, soft
music which Mrs. Haddo herself played on the organ!

"Oh yes," thought Betty, "one could be good here, and with the sort of
help that Margaret talks about; and high thoughts are nice thoughts,
they seem to be what I might call close to the angels. Nevertheless----"

A cloud seemed to fall on the little girl's spirit. She thought of
Fanny, and, raising her eyes at the moment, observed that Fanny's eyes
were fixed on her. Fanny's eyes were full of queer warning, even of
menace; and Betty suddenly experienced a revulsion of all those noble
feelings which had animated her a short time ago. Were there two Fanny
Crawfords? Or could she possibly look as she looked now, and also as she
had done when Margaret Grant read the rules of the Speciality Club
aloud?




CHAPTER IX

STRIVING FOR A DECISION


The week passed without anything very special occurring. The weather was
still warm and perfect. September had no idea of giving up her mantle of
late summer. But September was drawing to a close, and October, with
gusty winds and whirling, withered leaves, and much rain, would soon
take her place. October was certainly not nearly such a pleasant month
as September. Nevertheless, the young and healthy girls who lived their
regular life at Haddo Court were indifferent to the weather. They were
always busy. Each minute was planned out and fully occupied. There was
time for work, and time for play, and time for happy, confidential talks
in that bright and pleasant school. There were all kinds of surprises,
too; now an unexpected tea-party with Mrs. Haddo, given to a few select
girls; then, again, to another few who unexpectedly found themselves
select. There were also delightful cocoa-parties in the big private
sitting-room of the upper school, as well as games of every description,
outdoor and indoor. Night came all too soon in this happy family, and
each girl retired to bed wondering what could have made the day so very
short.

But during this week Betty was not quite happy. She had received a copy
of the rules, and had studied them very carefully. She was, in her heart
of hearts, most anxious to become a Speciality. The higher life appealed
to her. It appealed to her strong sense of imagination; to her
passionate and really unworldly nature; to that deep love which dwelt in
her heart, and which, just at present, she felt inclined to bestow on
Margaret Grant. But there was Rule I. The rules had been sent, as
Margaret had promised, neatly copied and in a sealed envelope, to
Betty's room. She had read them upstairs all alone in the Vivians'
attic. She had read them while the queer, uncanny eyes of Dickie looked
at her. She certainly was not afraid of Dickie; on the contrary, she
admired him. She and her sisters were very proud of his increasing size,
and each day it was the turn of one girl or the other to take Dickie out
of his cage and give him exercise. He was rather alarming in his
movements, going at a tremendous rate, and giving more than one uncanny
glance at the Vivian girl who was his jailer for the time.

On this special occasion, when Betty brought the rules to the Vivian
attic, she forgot all about Dickie. He was out, running round and round
the attic, rushing up the walls, peering at Betty from over the top of
the door, creeping as far as the ceiling and then coming down again. He
was, as a rule, easily caught, for Sylvia and Hetty always kept his meal
of raw meat till after he had had his exercise. But Betty had now
forgotten that it was necessary to have a bait to bring Dickie once more
into the shelter of his cage. She had consequently fed him first, then
let him free, and then stood by the small window of the attic reading
the rules of the Specialities. It was Rule I. which troubled her. Rule
I. ran as follows: "Each girl gives perfect confidence to her fellow
members, keeps no secret to herself which those members ought to know,
is ready to consider each member as though she were her own sister, to
help her in time of trouble and to rejoice with her in periods of joy."

To be quite frank, Betty did not like this rule. She was willing to give
a certain amount of affection to most of the girls who belonged to the
Specialities; but as to considering even nice girls like the Bertrams as
her own sisters, and Susie Rushworth (who was quite agreeable and gay
and kind) in that relationship, and Olive Repton also, as she would
Sylvia and Hetty, she did not think she could do it. She could be kind
to them--she would love to be kind to them; she would love to help each
and all in times of trouble, and to rejoice with them in periods of joy;
but to feel that they were her sisters--that certainly _was_ difficult.
She believed it possible that she could admit Margaret Grant into a
special and close relationship; into a deep friendship which partook
neither of sisterhood nor of anything else, but stood apart and
alone--the sort of friendship that a young, enthusiastic girl will give
to a friend of strong character a little older than herself. But as to
Fanny--she could never love Fanny. From the very first moment she had
set eyes on her--away, far away, in Scotland--she had disliked her, she
had pronounced her at once in her own mind as "niminy-priminy." She had
told her sisters frankly what she felt about Fanny. She had said in her
bold, independent way, "Fanny is too good for the likes of me. She is
the sort of girl who would turn me into a bad un. I don't want to have
anything to do with her."

Fanny, however, had taken no notice of Betty's all too evident
antagonism. Fanny was, in her heart of hearts, essentially good-natured;
but Betty was as impossible for her to understand as it was impossible
for the moon to comprehend the brightness of the sun. Fanny had been
shocked at what she had witnessed when she saw Betty take the sealed
packet from the drawer. She remembered the whole thing with great
distress of mind, and had felt a sense of shock when she heard that the
Vivian girls were coming to the school. But her feelings were very much
worse when her father had informed her that the packet could nowhere be
found--that he had specially mentioned it to Betty, who declared that
she knew nothing about it. Oh yes, Fanny and Betty were as the poles
apart; and Betty knew now that were she to take the vows of the
Specialities fifty times over she could never keep them, as far as Fanny
Crawford was concerned. Then there was another unpleasant part of the
same rule: "Each girl gives perfect confidence to her fellow-members,
keeps no secret to herself which those members ought to know." Betty
undoubtedly had a secret--a very precious one. She had even told a lie
in order to hug that secret to her breast. She had brought it away with
her to the school, and now it was safe--only Betty knew where.

What puzzled her was this: was it necessary for the members to know her
secret? It had nothing to do with any of them. Nevertheless, she was an
honest sort of girl and could not dismiss the feeling from her own mind
that Rule I. was practically impossible to her. The Specialities had met
on Thursday in Margaret Grant's room. The next meeting was to be held in
Susie Rushworth's. Susie's room was in another wing of the building, and
was not so large or luxurious as that of Margaret. The next meeting
would, however, be quite formal--except for the admission of Betty to
the full privileges of the club, and the reading aloud of the rules to
Martha West. During the course of the week the Specialities seldom or
never spoke of their meeting-day. Nevertheless, Betty from time to time
caught Fanny's watchful eyes fixed on her.

On the next Thursday morning she awoke with a slight headache. Miss
Symes noticed when she came downstairs that Betty was not quite herself,
and at once insisted on her going back to her room to lie down and be
coddled. Betty hated being coddled. She was never coddled in the gray
stone house; she was never coddled on the Scotch moors. She had
occasional headaches, like every one else, and occasional colds; but
they had to take care of themselves, and get well as best they could.
Betty used to shake herself with anger when she thought of any one
making a fuss about her when she was ill, and was consequently rather
cross when Miss Symes took her upstairs, made her lie down, and put a
wrap over her.

"You must lie down and try to sleep, Betty. I hope you will be quite
well by dinner-time. Don't stir till I come for you, dear."

"Oh, but I will!" said Betty, raising her head and fixing her bright,
almost feverish eyes on Miss Symes's face.

"What do you mean, dear? I have desired you to stay quiet."

"And I cannot obey," replied Betty. "Please, Miss Symes, don't be angry.
If I were a low-down sort of girl, I'd sneak out without telling you;
but as I happen to be Betty Vivian, I can't do that. I want to get into
the fresh air. Nothing will take away my headache like a walk. I want to
get as far as that dreadful piece of common land you have here, and
which you imagine is like a moor. I want to walk about there for a
time."

"Very well, Betty; you are a good girl to have confided in me. You have
exactly two hours. Stay quiet for one hour. If at the end of that time
your head is no better, out for an hour; then return to your usual
duties."

Betty lay very still for the whole of that hour. Her thoughts were busy.
She was haunted by Rule I., and by the passionate temptation to ignore
it and yet pretend that she would keep it--in short, to be a member of
the Specialities under false colors. One minute she was struggling hard
with the trouble which raged within her, the next minute she was making
up her mind to decline to be associated with the Specialities.

When the hour had quite expired she sprang to her feet. Oh yes, her head
still ached! But what did that matter? She could not be bothered with a
trifling thing like a mere headache. She ran upstairs to the Vivian
attic. Dickie was in his cage. Betty remembered what terrible trouble
she had had to catch him on the day when she received a copy of the
rules. She shook her head at him now, and said, "Ah Dickie, you're a bad
boy! I am not going to let you out of your cage again in a hurry." Then
she went out.

The wind had changed during the night, and heavy clouds were coming up
from the north. Betty felt herself much colder than she had ever done in
Scotland. She shivered, and walked very fast. She passed the celebrated
oak-tree where she and her sisters had hidden during their first day at
school. She went on to the place where the three little gardens were
marked for their benefit. But up to the present no Vivian had touched
the gardens, and there were the black remains of the bonfire where the
poor Scotch heather had been burnt almost in the center of Betty's
patch of ground.

Oh, the school was horrible--the life was horrible! Oh why had she ever
come here? She wanted to be a Speciality; but she could not, it was not
in her. She hated--yes, she hated--Fanny Crawford more each minute, and
she could never love those other uninteresting girls as though they were
her sisters. In analyzing her feelings very carefully, she came to the
conclusion that she only wanted to join the Specialities in order to be
Margaret's friend. She knew quite well what privileges would be accorded
to her were she a member; and she also knew--for she had been told--that
it was a rare thing to allow a girl so lately come to the school to take
such an important position.

Betty had a natural love of power. With a slight shudder she walked past
the little patches of ground and across what she contemptuously called
the miserable common. This common marked the boundaries of Mrs. Haddo's
school. There were iron railings at least six feet high guarding it from
the adjacent land. The sight of these railings was absolute torture to
Betty. She said aloud, "Didn't I know the whole place was a prison? But
prison-bars sha'n't keep me long in restraint!"

She took out her handkerchief, and, pulling up some weedy grass, put the
handkerchief on one spiked bar and the grass on the other, and thus
protecting herself, made a light bound over the fence. The exercise and
the sense of freedom did her good. She laughed aloud, and continued her
walk through unexplored regions. She could not go very fast, however;
for she was hindered here by and there by a gateway, and here again by a
farmstead, and yet again by a cottage, with little children running
about amongst the autumn flowers.

"How can people live in a place like this?" thought Betty.

Then, all of a sudden, two ferocious dogs rushed out upon the girl,
clamored round her, and tried to stop her way. Betty laughed softly.
There was a delightful sound in her laugh. Probably those dogs had never
heard its like before. It was also possible, notwithstanding the fact
that Betty was wearing a new dress, that something of that peculiar
instinct which is imparted to dogs told these desperate champions that
Betty had loved a dog before.

"Down, silly creature!" said Betty, and she patted one on the head and
put her arm on the neck of the other. Soon they were fawning about her
and jumping on her and licking her hands. She felt thoroughly happy now.
Her headache had quite vanished. The dogs, the darlings, were her true
friends! There was a little piece of grass quite close to where they had
attacked her, and she squatted deliberately down on it and invited the
dogs to stretch themselves by her side. They did so without a minute's
delay. They were in raptures with her, and one dog only growled when she
paid too much attention to the other.

She began to whisper alternately in the shaggy ears of each. "Ah, you
must have come from Scotland! You must, anyhow, have met Andrew! Do you
think you are as brave as Andrew, for I doubt it?"

Then she continued to the other dog, "And you must have been born in the
same litter with Fritz. Did you ever look into the eyes of Fritz and see
straight down into his gallant heart? I should be ashamed of you,
ashamed of you, if you were not as brave and noble as Fritz."

There was such pathos in Betty's voice that the dogs became quite
penitent and abject. They had certainly never been in Scotland, and
Andrew and Fritz were animals unknown to them; but for some reason the
mysterious being who understood dogs was displeased with them, and they
fawned and crouched at her feet.

It was just at that moment that a sturdy-looking farmer came up. He
gazed at Betty, then at the two dogs, uttered a light guffaw, and
vanished round the corner. In a very few minutes he returned,
accompanied by his sturdy wife and his two rough, growing sons.

"Wife," he said, "did you ever see the like in all your life--Dan and
Beersheba crouching down at that young girl's feet? Why, they're the
fiercest dogs in the whole place!"

"I heard them barking a while back," said Mrs. Miles, the farmer's wife,
"and then they stopped sudden-like. If I'd known they were here I'd have
come out to keep 'em from doing mischief to anybody; but hearing no more
sound I went on with my churning. Little miss," she added, raising her
voice, "you seem wonderful took with dogs."

Betty instantly rose to a standing position. "Yes, I am," she said.
"Please, are these Scotch, and have they come from Aberdeenshire?"

The farmer laughed. "No, miss," he said; "we bred 'em at home."

Betty was puzzled at this.

The dogs did not take the slightest notice of the farmer, his wife, or
his sons, but kept clinging to the girl and pressing their noses against
her dress.

"May I come again to see them, please?" asked Betty. "They've got the
spirit of the Scotch dogs. They are the first true friends I have met
since I left Scotland."

"And may I make bold to ask your name, miss?" inquired the farmer's
wife.

"Yes, you may," said Betty. "It isn't much of a name. It's just Betty
Vivian, and I live at Haddo Court."

"My word! Be you one of them young ladies?"

"I don't know quite what you mean; but I am Betty Vivian, and I live at
Haddo Court."

"But how ever did you get on the high road, miss?" asked the farmer.

Betty laughed. "I went to the edge of what they call the common," she
said. "I found a fence, and I vaulted over--that is all. I don't like
your country much, farmer; there's no space about it. But the dogs, they
are darlings!"

"You're the pluckiest young gel I ever come across," said the man. "How
you managed to tame 'em is more than I can say. Why, they are real
brutes when any one comes nigh the farm; and over and over I has said to
the wife, 'You ought to lock them brutes up,

Showing first 200,000 characters. Full text: gutenberg.org/ebooks/25510