“Queen Aneta and her subjects have much pleasure in accepting Queen Maggie’s invitation for the 15th inst.”
“Hip, hip, hurrah!” cried Kathleen. “The thing’s arranged, and we’ll have about the jolliest flare-up and the most enticing time that girls ever had at any school.” She sprang from her seat, and began tossing a book which had lain in her lap into the air, catching it again. In short, the subjects of the two queens broke up on the spot and chatted gaily together, and Maggie and her subjects could not be induced to say one word of what was to take place on the 15th of October.
“It is wonderful,” thought Aneta to herself. “Why does Mrs. Ward come? But, of course, as she comes we must all come.”
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE TREASURE.
Maggie had by no means forgotten her promise to the Tristram girls to give them a bracelet apiece. It was easy to do this, for they were her very special friends in the school. The 124 fact is that Molly and Belle had a somewhat peculiar position at Aylmer House, for they were not only Maggie’s special friends, but also the undoubted friends and allies of Cicely, Merry, and also of Aneta. But they were such good-humored, good-natured, pleasant sort of girls—so lively, so jolly—that they could take up a position with ease which would oppress and distress other people.
When Maggie presented them with their bracelets they were in wild raptures, accepting them gleefully, and on occasions when ornaments were permitted to be worn—which, as a matter of fact, was only in the leisure hours—they invariably had them on their arms.
But other girls noticed them, and one and all admired them immensely.