A general giggle went the round of the sextette.
“Not with my everyday ordinary ears, my child,” answered Emma, quite undisturbed. “It is that inner voice of duty that is making all the commotion. I would much rather bask in the light of your collected countenances than listen to those frenzied shrieks. But what of my trusting classes, who delight in writing themes and passing them on to me to be corrected?”
“Oh, yes; we all delight in writing themes,” jeered Nettie Weyburn, to whom theme writing was an irksome task. “My inner voice of duty is screaming at me this very minute to go and write one, but I’m so deaf I can’t hear it.”
“If you can’t hear it, how do you know it is screaming?” questioned Emma very solemnly.
“My intuition tells me,” retorted Nettie with triumphant promptness.
“Then I wish all my pupils in English had such marvelous intuitions,” sighed Emma.
“My inner voice of duty is wailing at me to go upstairs and finish my letter to my mother,” interposed Grace, rising. Her face had regained its usual brightness. She could not be sad in the presence of these light-hearted, capable girls, whose sturdy efforts to help themselves made them all so inexpressibly dear to her. She would help them all she could with their entertainment. She would write Arline and Elfreda to come to Overton for a few days and take part in the revue.
It was not until she had finished her letter to her mother and begun one to Elfreda that the sinister recollection again darkened her thoughts. She was living in the shadow of dismissal. Would it be wise to invite Arline and Elfreda to Harlowe House for a visit while she was so uncertain of what the immediate future held in store for her? If she tendered her resignation she intended it should take effect without delay. Once she had surrendered her precious charge she could not and would not remain at Harlowe House. Still she had promised her girls that she would help them. She had volunteered Arline’s and Elfreda’s services, knowing they would willingly leave their own affairs to journey back to Overton.
Grace laid down her pen. Resting her elbows on the table she cradled her chin in her hands, her vivid, changeful face overcast with moody thought. At last she raised her head with the air of one who has come to a decision, and, picking up her pen, went on with her letter to J. Elfreda Briggs. If worse came to worst and she resigned before the girls’ entertainment she would courageously put aside her own feelings and remain, at least, until afterward. It should be her last act of devotion to Harlowe House and her work.