It was high summer at Haversleigh. The trees, now in full leaf, cast rich shadows over the landscape, the wild roses were in bloom on the hedgerows, and tall foxgloves stood like crimson sentinels at the margins of the woods. The fields were white with moon-daisies, growing among the long, lush grass; and all the roadsides were a tangle of vetches, campion, bugle, trefoil and speedwells. The wind was fragrant with the scent of newly turned hay; everywhere the mowers were busy, and the daisies were falling fast beneath the swinging scythe or the blades of the reaping-machine. In the Manor garden the roses had reached perfection, and the flower-beds were a mass of colour. The girls spent every available moment out-of-doors, making the most of the bright days, and enjoying their country visit to the full.
One blazing half-holiday afternoon Lindsay and Cicely, allowed for once in the select company of a few of the elder girls, were lounging blissfully under the shade of a big hawthorn tree. The air seemed dancing for very heat; the grasshoppers were chirping away at the edge of the lawn, a lizard lay basking on the stones of the terrace wall, and the sparrows for once were silent.
"It's far too hot to play tennis," said Irene Spencer. "One just wants to sit somewhere where it's green and cool."
"I'm glad we're here, then, instead of at Winterburn Lodge," said Mary Parkinson.
"So am I; and yet Winterburn Lodge is nicer than many other schools," remarked Mildred Roper.
"It's not half bad," assented Mary. "I like it better, at any rate, than the French school I was at in Brussels."
"I didn't know you'd ever been in France," said Lindsay, idly picking a dandelion clock and blowing it to find out the time.
"No more I have, goosey."
"Then why did you say you'd been at a French school? You're telling fibs."
"No, I'm not, because Brussels doesn't happen to be in France—it's in Belgium."