The young Maybrights were all on their best behavior--Flower was on hers, and until the day of the picnic all went well. It did not take a great deal to rouse first the obstinate pride of this young Australian, and then her unbridled passions. Associate with a servant? No, that she would never, never do. Show Polly that she approved of her conduct? Not while her own name was Flower Dalrymple. She let all the other happy children go down to the banqueting-hall without her, and strode away, miserable at heart, choking with rage and fury. The Dalrymples were very wealthy people, and Flower's home in Ballarat was furnished with every luxury. Notwithstanding this, the little girl had never been in a truly refined dwelling-house until she took up her abode in old-fashioned Sleepy Hollow. Flower had taken a great fancy to Helen, and she already warmly loved Dr. Maybright. She was wandering over the moor now, a miserable, storm-tossed little personage, when she saw his old-fashioned gig and white pony "Rowney" approaching. That old gig and the person who sat in it--for Dr. Maybright drove himself--began to act on the heart of the child with a curious magnetic force. Step by step they caused her to turn, until she reached Troublous Times Castle almost as soon as the Doctor. She did not know why she was coming back, for she had not the remotest idea of yielding her will to Polly's. Still she had a kind of instinct that the Doctor would set things right. By this she meant that he would give her her own way and banish Maggie from the scene of festivity. The banqueting-hall at the old castle could be reached by two ways: you might approach it quite easily over the green sward, or you might enter a higher part of the castle, and come to it down broken steps. The Doctor chose one way of approaching the scene of the feast, Flower another. She was about to descend when she heard voices: Polly was eagerly asking permission for Maggie to dine with them; the Doctor, in his easy, genial tones, was giving it to her. That was enough. If Flower had never known before what absolute hatred was like, she knew it now. She hated Polly; ungovernable passion mounted to her brain, filled her eyes, lent wings to her feet; she turned and fled.