“Well, come, and let’s be very quick,” said Betty.
The girls walked across the bit of common. Margaret pointed out the heather, which was certainly scanty and poor.
Betty looked at it with scorn. “I think,” she said after a pause, “I don’t want to consult Birchall.” Then she added after another pause, “I think, on the whole, I’d much rather have no heather than plants like those. You are very kind, Margaret; but there are some things that can’t be transplanted, just as there are some hearts—that break—yes, break—if you take them from home. That poor heather—once, doubtless, it was very flourishing; it is evidently dying now of a sort of consumption. Let’s come back to our plots of ground, please, Margaret.”
They did so, and were there greeted by Olive, who had a large can of cold water standing by her side, and was eagerly talking to Sylvia and Hester. Betty marched first into the center plot of ground.
“I’ve got lots of water,” said Olive in a cheerful tone, “so we’ll do the watering at once. Sylvia and Hester say that they must have a third each of this canful; but of course we can get a second can if we want it.”
“No!” said Betty.
Sylvia, who was gazing with lack-lustre eyes at the fading heather, now started and looked full at her sister. Hester, who always clung to Sylvia in moments of emotion, caught her sister’s hand and held it very tight.
“No,” said Betty again; “I have made a discovery. Scotch heather does not grow here in this airless sort of place. Sylvia and Hester, Margaret was good enough to show me what she calls heather. There are a few straggling plants just at the other side of that bit of common. I don’t want ours to die slowly. Our plants shall go at once. No, we don’t water them. Sylvia, go into your garden and pull up the plant; and, Hester, you do likewise Go, girls; go at once!”
“But, Betty——” said Margaret.