he added. "There are no
end of things to be done, besides, at the rehearsal." Here she dropped
her voice slightly.

"The rest of you can go to the sitting-room and do what is necessary,"
continued Aneta. "I want you, Maggie, and you had better come with
me." She spoke very firmly.

A dogged look came into Maggie's face. She threw back her head and
glanced full at Aneta. "I go with you," she said, "just because you
ask me, forsooth! You forget yourself, Queen Aneta. I also am a queen
and have a kingdom."

"My business with you has something to do with a person who calls
herself Tildy," said Aneta in her gravest voice; and Maggie suddenly
felt as though a cold douche had been thrown over her. She colored a
vivid red. Then she turned eagerly to Kathleen.

"I won't be a minute," she said. "You all go into the sitting-room and
get the accounts in order. You might also go over that tableaux with
Diana Vernon.--Kathleen, you know that you must put a little more life
into your face than you did the other day; and--and--oh dear, how
annoying this is!--Yes, of course I will go with you, Aneta. You won't
keep me a minute?"

Maggie and Aneta left the room.

Merry turned to her sister and said in a troubled voice, "I can't
imagine why it is that Aneta doesn't care for poor Maggie. I love
Aneta, of course, for she is our very own cousin; but I cannot
understand her want of sympathy for dearest Maggie."

"I am not altogether quite so fond of Maggie as you are, Merry; and
you know that," said Cicely.

"I know it," said Merry. "You are altogether taken up with Aneta."

"Oh, and with school generally," said Cicely, "it is all so splendid.
But come, we are alone in the room, and losing some of our delightful
leisure hours."

The Maggie-girls had meanwhile retired into the sitting-room, where
they stood together in groups, talking about the excitement which was
to take place on the following Saturday (it was now Thursday), and
paying very little heed to Maggie's injunctions to put the accounts in
order.

"Don't bother about accounts," said Kitty; "there's heaps of money
left in the bag. Wasn't it scrumptious of old Mags to put a whole
sovereign in? And I know she is not rich, the dear old precious!"

"She is exactly the sort of girl who would do a generous thing," said
Clara Roache, "and of course, as queen, she felt that she must put a
little more money into the bag than the rest of us."

"Well, she needn't," said Kathle