"I always get sick when I get angry," said Bet shamefacedly.
"Then my advice to you is, don't get angry any more." Miss Elder had her arm about the girl and was half laughing at the serious face of the child. "Now run along home, Bet, and don't let me ever hear of you getting angry again. Promise!"
"Oh Miss Elder, I couldn't promise that. You know I get cross over the slightest thing. Dad says so! But I'll promise to try hard. Will that do? Besides I'll never be able to keep good natured when Edith is around."
"Dear girl, you must get over your habit of becoming so tense over unimportant matters. If you can't learn to like Edith, learn to be indifferent."
"I'll try ever so hard, Miss Elder but just now she's a thorn in my flesh, and oh, how she hurts!"
And Bet did try in the weeks that followed to be indifferent to Edith, but it seemed to her as if Edith went out of her way to say and do unkind things.
"It's no use," Bet often said to herself. "I'm as indifferent as I can be, but oh! how I despise that girl!"
Antagonism against Kit Patten grew daily in the heart of Edith Whalen. That Kit could come into Lynnwood and immediately get into the set that she would like to be in, was sufficient reason for Edith's enmity.
Kit was liked by all the girls and boys. Her ready smile, a knack of getting a quick and appropriate answer back when they tried to tease her, made her a popular girl. In the class club she was appointed on committees and soon was taking an active part in the organization. And what Kit did, she did well and her natural charm made new friends for her daily.
Then when Kit suddenly pushed ahead in her studies and became a leader, this seemed the spur that made Edith display her enmity toward the girl. For Edith was so self-centered that any charm she might have possessed was being smothered and her sly and treacherous ways, kept her acquaintances either indifferent to her or decidedly against her.