Once outside Overton Hall her composure took wings and she brushed the thick-gathering tears from her eyes as she hurried blindly across the snow-covered campus in the gray twilight. She was still smarting under the hurt of the registrar's sharp words. It was unspeakably humiliating to be told that she had overstepped her authority. She had thought that Miss Sheldon knew her too well for that. It merely served to show how little one knew persons, she reflected bitterly. As for Evelyn, the angry color dyed Grace's cheeks afresh as she thought of the girl's treachery, and she made a resentful vow that Evelyn Ward should not be admitted to Harlowe House for her sophomore year.
The brisk walk across the campus in the crisp winter air cooled her anger, and by the time she had reached the house she felt her resentment, in a measure, vanishing.
"You were right, Emma," she announced as she walked into their room where Emma sat plodding laboriously through her weekly mending.
"About Evelyn?"
"Yes."
Emma finished the sleeve of the blouse she was mending with a flourish. Then, casting a swift, upward glance at Grace, she began singing dolorously.
"Mend, mend, mend,
On the waist that's weary and worn.
Stitch, stitch, stitch,
Each tatter so jagged and torn.
Collar and cuffs and sleeves,
Cobble and darn and baste,
Before they gape in a ghastly row,
And shriek the dirge of the waist."
Grace's gloomy expression changed to a faint smile which broadened as Emma's chant went on. At the end of the verse she laughed outright.
"I couldn't be sad for long with you about, Emma," she said affectionately. "How can you think of such funny things on the spur of the moment?"
"Oh, I don't know," drawled Emma. "Tell me about everything, Gracious."