Nancy Ellen was worried, until she was pale.
"Kate," she said, "I never have seen Father so angry in all my
life. I thought last night that in a day or two I could switch
the school over to Serena Woodruff, and go on with my plans, but
Father said at breakfast if the Bates name was to stand for
anything approaching honour, a Bates would teach that school this
winter or he'd know the reason why. And you know how easy it is
to change him. Oh, Kate, won't you see if that Walden trustee
can't possibly find another teacher, and let you off? I know
Robert will be disappointed, for he's rented his office and bought
a house and he said last night to get ready as soon after
Christmas as I could. Oh, Kate, won't you see if you can't
possibly get that man to hire another teacher?"
"Why, Nancy Ellen --" said Kate.
Nancy Ellen, with a twitching face, looked at Kate.
"If Robert has to wait months, there in Hartley, handsome as he
is, and he has to be nice to everybody to get practice, and you
know how those Hartley girls are --"
"Yes, Nancy Ellen, I know," said Kate. "I'll see what I can do.
Is it understood that if I give up the school and come back and
take ours, Father will let me come home?"
"Yes, oh, yes!" cried Nancy Ellen.
"Well, nothing goes on guess-work. I'll hear him say it, myself,"
said Kate.
She climbed from the buggy. Nancy Ellen caught her arm.
"Don't go in there! Don't you go there," she cried. "He'll throw
the first thing he can pick up at you. Mother says he hasn't been
asleep all night."
"Pooh!" said Kate. "How childish! I want to hear him say that,
and he'll scarcely kill me."
She walked swiftly to the side door.
"Father," she said, "Nancy Ellen is afraid she will lose Robert
Gray if she has to put off her marriage for months --"
Kate stepped back quickly as a chair crashed against the door
facing. She again came into view and continued -- "so she asked
me if I would get out of my school and come back if I could" --
Kate dodged another chair; when she appeared again -- "To save the
furniture, of which we have none too much, I'll just step inside,"
she said. When her father started toward her, she started around
the dining table, talking as fast as she could, he lunging after
her like a furious bull. "She asked me to come back and teach the
school -- to keep her from putting off her wedding -- because she
is afraid to -- If I can break my contract there -- may I come
back and help her out here?"