“The bride and her maidens sat in her bower——”
She nodded to William loitering near the High School gate, and hurried on. She did not want company just now:
“And they ’broidered a snow-white veil,
And their laughter was sweet as the orange flower
That breathed on the soft south gale.”
But here William caught up with her. She had thought he would take the hint, but he didn’t, going with her to her very gate. But once inside, she drew a long breath. The cherry buds were swelling and the sky was blue. She took up her verse where William had interrupted:
“The bride and her maidens sit in her bower,
And they stitch at a winding-sheet;
And they weep as the breath of the orange flower——”
Emily is so absorbed at the dinner-table that Aunt Cordelia is moved to argue about it. She sha’n’t go to school if she does not eat her dinner when she gets home. “And that beautiful slice of good roast beef untouched,” says Aunt Cordelia.
Emily frowned, being intent on that last line, which is not written yet. She is hunting the rhyme for winding-sheet.
What is this Aunt Cordelia is saying? “Eat—meat——”
How can Aunt Cordelia?—it throws one off—it upsets one.
Hattie chanced to be criticising Miss Beaton the next day, saying that she required too little of her classes. “But then she is more concerned getting ready to be married, I reckon,” said Hattie.