lor
coming over her face; "but confess about this, Annie Forest!--I think you
are mad. You dare not tell."

"All right," said Annie, "I won't, unless you all agree to it," and then
she continued her walk, leaving Susan standing on the graveled path with
her hands clasped together, and a look of most genuine alarm and dismay
on her usually phlegmatic face.

Susan quickly found Phyllis and Nora, and it was only too easy to arouse
the fears of these timid little people. Their poor little faces became
almost pallid, and they were not a little startled at the fact of Annie
Forest, their own arch-conspirator, wishing to betray their secret.

"Oh," said Susan Drummond, "she's not out and out shabby; she says she
won't tell unless we all wish it. But what is to become of the basket?"

"Come, come, young ladies; no whispering, if you please," said Miss Good,
who came up at this moment. "Susan, you are looking pale and cold, walk
up and down that path half-a-dozen times, and then go into the house.
Phyllis and Nora, you can come with me as far as the lodge. I want to
take a message from Mrs. Willis to Mary Martin about the fowl for
to-morrow's dinner."

Phyllis and Nora, with dismayed faces, walked solemnly away with the
English teacher, and Susan was left to her solitary meditations.

Things had come to such a pass that her slow wits were brought into play,
and she neither felt sleepy, nor did she indulge in her usual habit of
eating lollipops.

That basket might be discovered any day, and then--then disgrace was
imminent. Susan could not make out what had become of old Betty; never
before had she so utterly failed them.

Betty lived in a little cottage about half a mile from Lavender House.
She was a sturdy, apple-cheeked, little old woman, and had for many a day
added to her income--indeed, almost supported herself--by means of the
girls at Lavender House. The large cherry-trees in her little garden bore
their rich crop of fruit year after year for Mrs. Willis' girls, and
every day at an early hour Betty would tramp into Sefton and return with
a temptingly-laden basket of the most approved cakes and tarts. There was
a certain paling at one end of the grounds to which Betty used to come.
Here on the grass she would sit contentedly, with the contents of her
baskets arranged in the most tempting order before her, and to this
seductive spot she knew well that those little misses who loved goodies,
cakes and tartlets would