if you would let me have a secret with you. It
is so nice to have a secret, and it is so hard to get one. Everybody
knows all about everything."

"I don't agree with you; I hate secrets," said Hetty. "This is not much
of one, I think, but it is somebody else's affair, and I will not tell
it."

Having wrung so much as this from Hetty, Nell grew wildly excited over
the matter, and was so annoyed at not having her curiosity gratified
that she went away out of the room in a hurry without having seen
whether Hetty was warm enough or not. On her return to the school-room
she announced that Hetty could not tell anything about how she had
passed the afternoon, because it was somebody else's secret.

"Perhaps she has been bringing some village girl or boy into the
grounds," said Phyllis quietly.

"I will talk to her myself about this," said Miss Davis; "pray attend to
your studies."

Miss Davis on reflection thought Phyllis might be right, and that having
made acquaintance with some young companion in Mrs. Kane's cottage,
Hetty might have been induced to admit her or him to the grounds so as
to give pleasure. She knew how strongly the child was influenced by her
likings and lovings, and feared that this might be the case of Scamp
over again, with the important difference that Hetty was now a girl in
her twelfth year, and that her new favourite might prove to be a human
being instead of a dog.

The next day Hetty was seriously ill. She had caught a severe cold and
lay tossing feverishly in her bed. Miss Davis came up to see her in the
afternoon and sat at her bedside for half an hour.

"Hetty," she said, "I fear you must have been very foolish yesterday,
and that your cold is the consequence. Now that we are alone I expect
you will tell me exactly all that you did."

"I can't indeed, Miss Davis."

"You disappoint me exceedingly. I had been thinking so much better of
you; I conclude you were not alone yesterday."

"Not all the time, but most of it."

"Who was with you when you were not alone?"

Hetty hesitated, and then said, "Mark."

"But Mark was out riding with his father."

"Yes."

"And you were alone all that time."

"Yes."

"And yet there is something behind that you will not tell. Hetty, I
always thought you frank till now. Why are you making a mystery?"

"I can't tell you, Miss Davis; I was not doing any harm."

"How am I to believe that?" said Miss Davis.

"Oh, my head!" moaned Hetty, as the pa