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 s