Cicely uneasy.

Meanwhile Maggie and Merry had found a cosy corner for themselves in
one of the conservatories. They sat side by side in two little
garden-chairs.

"Well, you've come!" said Maggie. "I have carried out my design. My
heart's desire is satisfied."

"Oh, how sweet you are, Maggie!" said Merry. "I have missed you so
much!" she added. "I have so often wished for you!"

"Do you really love me?" asked Maggie, looking at Merry in her queer,
abrupt manner.

"You know I do," said Merry.

"Well," said Maggie, "there are a great many girls in the school who
love me very dearly."

"It is easy to perceive that," said Merry. "Why, Maggie, at tea-time
that handsome little Irish girl--Kathleen you call her--couldn't take
her eyes off you."

"Oh, Kitty," said Maggie. "Yes, she is on my side."

"What do you mean by your side?"

"Well, of course I have told you--haven't I?--that there are two of us
in this school who are more looked up to than the others. It seems
very conceited for me to say that I happen to be one. Of course I am
not a patch on Aneta; I know that perfectly well."

"Aneta is a darling," said Merry; "and she is my own cousin; but"--she
dropped her voice--"Maggie, somehow, I can't help loving you best."

"Oh," said Maggie with a start, "is that true?"

"It is! it is!"

Maggie was silent for a minute. At the end of that time she said very
gently, "You won't be hurt at something I want to tell you?"

"Hurt! No," said Merry; "why should I be?"

"Well, it is just this: Aneta is frightfully jealous of me."

"Oh! I don't believe it," said Merry indignantly. "It isn't in her
nature to be jealous. It's very low-minded to be jealous."

"There is no school," said Maggie, "where jealousy does not abound.
There is no life into which jealousy does not enter. The world itself
is made up of jealous people. Aneta is jealous of me, and I--I am
jealous of her."

"Oh, Maggie dear, you must not, and you ought not to be jealous of
Aneta! She thinks so kindly, so sweetly of every one."

"She loves you," said Maggie. "You just go and tell her how much you
care for me, that you love me better than you love her, and see how
she will take it."

"But I wouldn't tell her that," said little Merry, "for it would hurt
her."

"There!" said Maggie with a laugh; "and yet you pretend that you don't
think her jealous."

"She will never be jealous of me, for I'll never give her cause--dear
Aneta!" said Merry.