"Yes, yes; only I don't understand. Betty had a perfect right to poke her hand into the hollow of the tree, and to bring up a piece of wood, and look at it, and put it back again; and I don't understand your expression, Fanny, that it all depends on the point of view." "Keep this to yourself, and I will give you some more chocolates sometime," was Fanny's answer. "I can be your friend as well as Martha--that is, if you are nice, and don't repeat every single thing you hear. The worst sin in a schoolgirl--at least, the worst minor sin--is to be breaking confidences. No schoolgirl with a shade of honor in her composition would ever do that, and certainly no girl trained at Haddo Court ought to be noted for such a characteristic. Now, Sibyl, you are no fool; and, when I talk to you, you are not to repeat things. I may possibly want to talk to you again, and then there'll be more chocolates and--and--other things; and as you are in the upper school, and are really quite a nice girl, I shouldn't be at all surprised if I invited you to have tea with me in my bedroom some night--oh, not quite yet, but some evening not far off. Now, off with you, and let me see how well you can keep an innocent little confidence between you and me!" Sibyl ran off, munching her chocolates, wondering a good deal at Fanny's manner, but in the excitement of her school-life, soon forgetting both her and Betty Vivian. For, after all, there was no story worth thinking about. There was nothing in the hollow of the old tree but the piece of wood, and nothing--nothing in the wide world--could be made interesting out of that. Meanwhile, Fanny thought for a time. The first great entertainment of the Specialities was over. Betty was now a full-blown member, and as such must be treated in a manner which Fanny could not possibly have assumed towards her before this event took place. Fanny blamed herself for her weakness in consenting to keep Betty's secret. She had done so on the spur of the moment, influenced by the curious look in the girl's eyes, and wondering if she would turn to her with affection if she, Fanny, were so magnanimous. But Betty had not turned to her with either love or affection. Betty was precisely the Betty she had been before she joined the club. It is true she was very much sought after and consulted on all sorts of matters, and her name was whispered in varying notes of admiration among the girls, and she was likely (unless a spoke were put in her wheel) to rise to one of the highest positions in the great school. Betty had committed one act of flagrant wickedness. Fanny was not going to mince matters; she could not call it by any other name. There were no extenuating circumstances, in her opinion, to excuse this act of Betty's. The fact that she had first stolen the packet, and then told Sir John Crawford a direct lie with regard to it, was the sort of thing that Fanny could never get over.