ng it to her. That was enough. If Flower
had never known before what absolute hatred was like, she knew it now.
She hated Polly; ungovernable passion mounted to her brain, filled her
eyes, lent wings to her feet; she turned and fled.

Although the month was October, it was still very hot in the middle of
the day on the open moor. Flower, however, was accustomed to great heat
in her native home, and the full rays of the sun did not impede her
flight. She was so tall and slight and willowy that she was a splendid
runner, but the moor was broken and rough, interspersed here and there
with deep bracken, here and there with heather, here and there again
with rank clumps of undergrowth. The young girl, half blinded with rage
and passion, did not see the sharp points of the rocks or the brambles
in her path. Once or twice she fell. After her second fall she was so
much bruised and hurt, that she was absolutely forced to sit still in
the midst of the yellow-and-brown bracken. It was in a bristling,
withered state, but it still stood thick and high, and formed a kind of
screen all round Flower as she sat in it. She took off her cap, and idly
fanned her hot face with it; her yellow head could scarcely be
distinguished from the orange-and-gold tints of the bracken which
surrounded her.

In this way the Doctor, who was now anxiously looking for Flower, missed
her, for he drove slowly by, not a hundred yards from her hiding-place.

As Flower sat and tried to cool herself, she began to reflect. Her
passion was not in the least over; on the contrary, its most dangerous
stage had now begun. As she thought, there grew up stronger and stronger
in her heart a great hatred for Polly. From the first, Flower had not
taken so warmly to Polly as she had done to Helen. The fact was, these
girls were in many ways too much alike. Had it been Polly's fate to be
born and brought up in Ballarat, she might have been Flower over again.
She might have been even worse than Flower, for she was cleverer; on the
other hand, had Flower been trained by Polly's wise and loving mother,
she might have been a better girl than Polly.

As it was, however, these two must inevitably clash. They were like two
queen bees in the same hive; they each wanted the same place. It only
needed a trifle to bring Flower's uneasy, latent feeling against Polly
to perfection. The occasion arose, the match had fired the easily
ignited fuel, and Flower sat now and wondered how sh