“I am quite sure,” said Margaret, “that there isn’t a better girl in the school than Martha, and I have serious thoughts of asking her to become a Speciality.” As she spoke she fixed her very dark eyes on Fanny’s face.
“Do ask her; I shall be delighted,” remarked Fanny. “Only, whatever you do, don’t ask her friend, Sibyl Ray.”
“I have no present intention of doing so. Fanny, I don’t want to be nasty; but you are quite right about Sibyl. No one can say a word against her; and yet she just is not well-bred.”
CHAPTER VIII
A NEW MEMBER
The picnic was a great success. The day was splendid. The sun shone in a sky which was almost cloudless. The motor-cars were all in prime condition. There were no accidents of any sort. The girls laughed and chatted, and enjoyed life to the utmost; and the Vivian girls were amongst the merriest in those large and varied groups.
The twins invariably followed in Betty’s footsteps, and Betty possessed that curious mixture of temperament which threw her into the depths of anguish one moment and sent her spirits flying like a rocket skyward the next. Betty’s spirits were tending skyward on this happy day. She was also making friends in the school, and was delighted to walk with Margaret and Susie and Olive. Fanny did not trouble her at all; but Martha West chatted with her for a whole long hour, and, as Martha knew Scotland, a very strong link was immediately established between the girls.
A thoroughly happy picnic—a perfect one—is usually lived through without adventure. There are no contretemps, no unhappy moments, no jealousies, no heart-burnings. These are the sort of picnics which come to us very rarely in life, but they do come now and then. In one sense, however, they are uninteresting, for they have no history—there is little or nothing to say about them. Other picnics are to follow in this story which ended differently, which led to tangled knots and bitter heart-burnings. But the first picnics from Haddo Court in which Betty Vivian took part was, in a way, something like that first morning when she joined the other girls in whispering her prayers in the beautiful chapel.
The picnic came and went, and in course of time the day arrived when Betty was to be the honored guest of the Specialities. On the morning of that day Fanny made another effort to induce Betty to renounce the idea of becoming a Speciality. She had spent a sleepless night thinking over the matter, and by the morning had made up her mind what to do.