"Now look here, Grace Ford!" exclaimed Betty briskly, pausing a moment on her way to the door. "You just stop this! If no one is dead, and no one is hurt, then it can't be so very dreadful. You just stop now, and when we all get together we'll help you in whatever trouble you have. You know that; don't you?"
"Oh, yes, Betty, I do. You aren't the 'Little Captain' to all of us for nothing. I'll try and not cry any more."
"Do. It—it isn't at all becoming. Your nose is positively like a—lobster!"
"It is not, Betty Nelson!" Grace flared.
"It certainly is. Look in the glass if you don't believe me. There—take my chamois and give it a little rub before I let in Amy and Mollie. It's only nice, clean talcum—you needn't think it's powder."
"All right—as if talcum wasn't powder, though," and Grace smiled through the traces of her recent tears.
"That's better," decided Betty, with a nod of her shapely head and a bright look from her sparkling eyes. "Yes, I'll be there in a moment," she called as there came another ring at the bell.
"Shall I bring them right in, Grace?" she called over her shoulder, as she neared the door.
"Yes—yes. I might as well—have it over with," faltered the weeping one.
"Gracious, you'd think someone was going to be hanged, or beheaded, or sent to the galleys for life—or some other dreadful thing such as we read of in our ancient histories," commented Betty. "Cheer up, Grace. There may be worse to come."