THE EVENING BEFORE THE WEDDING.
"Now, where is that portmanteau?"
"It is in my room."
"Strapped up?"
"Yes."
"Let me take it down to the cab. Have you anything else to do?"
"Only to change my dress."
"Don't be long about it; it is seven o'clock. I will wait for you
downstairs."
Mr. Yelverton walked into the passage, possessed himself of the
portmanteau, and descended the stairs to the little hall below. The
wide-eyed maid-of-all-work hastened to offer her services. She had
never volunteered to carry luggage for the Miss Kings, but she seemed
horrified at the sight of this stalwart gentleman making a porter of
himself. "Allow me, sir," she said, sweetly, with her most engaging
smile.
"Thank you, my girl; I think I am better able to carry it than you
are," he said, pleasantly. But he scrutinised her face with his keen
eyes for a moment, and then took a sovereign from his pocket and
slipped it into her hand. "Go and see if you can help Miss King," he
said. "And ask her if there is anything you can do for her while she is
away from home."
"Oh, sir"--simpering and blushing--"I'm sure--_anything_--" and
she rushed upstairs and offered her services to Elizabeth in such
acceptable fashion that the bride-elect was touched almost to tears, as
by the discovery of a new friend. It seemed to her that she had never
properly appreciated Mary Ann before.
Mr. Yelverton meanwhile paced a few steps to and fro on the footpath
outside the gate, looking at his watch frequently. Paul Brion was at
home, listening to his father's account of the afternoon's events and
the news of the imminent marriage, with moody brow and heavy heart; it
was the end of the romance for _him_, he felt, and he was realising
what a stale and flat residuum remained in his cup of life. He had seen
Mr. Yelverton go to No. 6 with fierce resentment of the liberty that
the fortunate lover permitted himself to take with those sacred rights
of single womanhood which he, Paul, had been so scrupulous to observe;
now he watched the tall man pacing to and fro in the street below,
waiting for his bride, with a sense of the inequalities of fortune that
made him almost bloodthirsty. He saw the portmanteau set on end by the
cabdriver's seat; he saw Elizabeth come forth with a bag in one hand
and an umbrella in the other, followed by the servant with an ulster
and a bonnet-box. He watched the dispossessed master of Yelverton, who,
after all, had lost nothing, and had gained so much, and the great
heiress who was to know Myrtle Street and obscurity no more, as they
took their seats in the vehicle, she handed in by him with such tender
and yet masterful care. He had an impulse to go out upon the balcony
to bid her good-bye and God-speed, but he checked it proudly; and,
surveying her departure from the window of his sitting-room, convinced
himself that she was too much taken up with her own happiness to so
much as remember his existence. It was the closing scene of the Myrtle
Street drama--the last chapter of the charming little homely story
which had been the romance of his life. No more would he see the girls
going in and out of the gate of No. 7, nor meet them in the gardens
and the street, nor be privileged to offer them his assistance and
advice. No more would he sit on his balcony of nights to listen to
Beethoven sonatas and Schubert serenades. The sponge had been passed
over all those pleasant things, and had wiped them out as if they had
never been. There were no longer any Miss Kings. And for Paul there
was no longer anything left in life but arid and flavourless newspaper
work--the ceaseless grinding of his brains in the great mill of the
Press, which gave to the world its daily bread of wisdom, but had no
guerdon for the producers of that invaluable grist.
In truth, Elizabeth _did_ forget all about him. She did not lift her
eyes to the window where he sat; she could see and think of nothing but
herself and her lover, and the wonderful circumstances that immediately
surrounded them. When the cabman closed the door upon them, and they
rattled away down the quiet street, it was borne in upon her that she
really _was_ going to be married on the morrow; and that circumstance
was far more than enough to absorb her whole attention. In the suburbs
through which they passed it was growing dusk, and the lamps were
lighted. A few carriages were taking people out to dinner. It was
already evening--the day was over. Mrs. Duff-Scott was standing on her
doorstep as they drove up to the house, anxiously looking out for them.
She had not changed her morning dress; nor had Patty, who stood beside
her. All the rules of daily life were suspended at this crisis. A grave
footman came to the door of the cab, out of which Mr. Yelverton helped
Elizabeth, and then led her into the hall, where she was received in
the fairy godmother's open arms.
"Take care of her," he said to Patty, "and make her rest herself. I
will come back about nine or ten o'clock."
Patty nodded. Mrs. Duff-Scott tried to keep him to dinner, but he
said he had no time to stay. So the cab departed with him, and his
betrothed was hurried upstairs to her bedroom, where there ensued a
great commotion. Even Mrs. Duff-Scott, who had tried to stand upon
her dignity a little, was unable to do so, and shared the feverish
excitement that possessed the younger sisters. They were all a little
off their heads--as, indeed, they must have been more than women
not to be. The explanations and counter-explanations, the fervid
congratulations, the irrepressible astonishment, the loving curiosity,
the tearful raptures, the wild confusion of tongues and miscellaneous
caresses, were very bewildering and upsetting. They did, in fact, bring
on that attack of hysterics, the first and last in Elizabeth's life,
which had been slowly generating in her healthy nervous system under
the severe and various trials of the day. This little accident sobered
them down, and reminded them of Mr. Yelverton's command that Elizabeth
was to be made to rest herself. The heiress was accordingly laid upon
a sofa, much against her wish, and composed with sal-volatile, and
eau-de-cologne, and tea, and fans, and a great deal of kissing and
petting.
"But I _cannot_ understand this excessive, this abnormal haste," Mrs.
Duff-Scott said, when the girl seemed strong enough to bear being
mildly argued with. "Mr. Yelverton explains it very plausibly, but
still I can't understand it, from _your_ point of view. Patty's theory
is altogether untenable."
"I don't understand it either," the bride-elect replied. "I think I had
an idea that it might prevent him from knowing or realising that I was
giving him the money instead of his giving it to me--I wanted to be
beforehand with Mr. Brion. But of course that was absurd. And if you
can persuade him to put it off for a few weeks--"
"O dear no!--I know him too well. He is not a man to be persuaded.
Well, I am thankful he is going to let you be married in church. I
expected he would insist on the registry office. And he has promised to
bring you back to me at the end of a fortnight or so, to stay here all
the time till you go home. That is something." The fairy godmother was
certainly a little huffy--for all these wonderful things had come to
pass without her permission or assistance--but in her heart of hearts,
as Mr. Yelverton had suspected, she was charmed with the situation, and
as brimful of sympathy for the girl in her extraordinary circumstances
as her own mother could have been.
They had a quiet dinner at eight o'clock, for which the major, who had
been despatched to his solicitors (to see about the drawing up of that
"instrument" which Miss Yelverton's _fiancé_ and cousin required her to
sign on her own behalf before her individuality was irrevocably merged
in his), returned too late to dress, creeping into the house gently
as if he had no business to be there; and Elizabeth sat at her host's
right hand, the recipient of the tenderest attentions and tit-bits.
The little man, whose twinkling eye had lost its wonted humour, was
profoundly touched by the events that had transpired, and saddened by
the prospect of losing that sister of the three whom he had made his
own particular chum, and with the presentiment that her departure would
mean the loss of the others also. He could not even concern himself
about the consequences to his wife of their removal from the circle
of her activities, so possessed was he by the sad vision of his house
left desolate. Perhaps the major felt himself getting old at last, and
realised that cakes and ale could not be heaped upon his board for
ever. He was certainly conscious of a check in his prosperous career,
by the translation of the Miss Kings, and a feeling of injury in that
Providence had not given him children that he _could_ have kept around
him for the solace of his declining years. It was hard to have just
learned what it was to have charming daughters, and then to be bereaved
of them like this, at a moment's notice. Yet he bore his disappointment
with admirable grace; for the little major, despite all the traditions
of his long-protracted youth, was the most unselfish of mortals, and a
gentleman to the marrow of his bones.
In the evening he went to town again, to find Mr. Yelverton. Mrs.
Duff-Scott, when dinner was over, had a consultation with her cook,
and made arrangements for a festive luncheon for the following day.
The girls went upstairs again, and thither their adopted mother
presently followed them, and they spent an hour together in Elizabeth's
bedroom, absorbed in the sad but delightful business of overhauling
her portmanteau. By this time they were able to discuss the situation
with sobriety--a sobriety infused with much chastened emotion, to be
sure, but still far removed from the ferment of hysterics. Patty, in
particular, had a very bracing air about her.
"Now I call this _life_," she said, flourishing open the skirt of one
of Elizabeth's dresses to see if it was fit to be worn on a wedding
journey; "I call this really _living_. One feels as if one's faculties
were given for some purpose. After all, it is not necessary to go
to Europe to see the world. It is not necessary to travel to gain
experience and to have adventures. Is not this frock too shabby, Mrs.
Duff-Scott--all things considered?"
"Certainly," assented that lady, promptly. "Put in her new cashmere and
the Indian silk, and throw away those old things now."
"Go and get the Indian silk, Nelly. It is in the wardrobe. And don't
hang over Elizabeth in that doleful manner, as if she were going to
have her head cut off, like Lady Jane Grey. She is one of the happiest
women on the face of the earth--or, if she isn't, she ought to be--with
such a prospect before her. Think of it! It is enough to make one gnash
one's teeth with envy."
"Let us hope she will indeed realise her prospects," said Mrs.
Duff-Scott, feeling called upon to reprove and moderate the pagan
spirit that breathed in Patty's words. "Let us hope she will be as
happy in the future as she is now."
"Oh, she will--she will! Let us hope she will have enough troubles to
keep her from being _too_ happy--too happy to last," said the girl
audaciously; "that is the danger she will want preserving from."
"You may say what you like, but it is a rash venture," persisted the
matron, shaking her head. "She has known him but for such a _very_
short time. Really, I feel that I am much to blame to let her run into
it like this--with so little knowledge of what she is undertaking.
And he _has_ a difficult temperament, Elizabeth. There is no denying
it--good and nice as he is, he is terribly obstinate about getting
his own way. And if he is so _now_, what will he be, do you suppose,
presently?"
Patty, sitting on her heels on the floor, with her sister's clothes
spread around her, looked up and laughed.
"Ah! that is one safeguard against too much happiness, perhaps. I do
think, with Mrs. Duff-Scott, that you have met your master, my dear."
"I don't think it," replied Elizabeth, serenely. "I know I have."
"And you are quite content to be mastered?"
"Yes--by him."
"Of course you are. Who would marry a chicken-hearted milksop if she
could get a splendid tyrant like that?" exclaimed Patty, fervently,
for the moment forgetting there were such things as woman's rights
in the world. "I wouldn't give a straw for a man who let you have
your own way--unless, of course, he was no wiser than you. A man who
sets up to domineer when he can't carry it out thoroughly is the most
detestable and contemptible of created beings, but there is no want of
thoroughness about _him_. To see him standing up at the table in the
library this afternoon and defying Mrs. Duff-Scott to prevent him from
marrying you to-morrow did one's heart good. It did indeed."
"I daresay," said the fairy godmother. "But I should like to see _you_
with a man like that to deal with. It is really a pity he did not take
to you instead of Elizabeth. I should have liked to see what would have
happened. The 'Taming of the Shrew' would have been a trifle to it."
"Well," said Patty, "he will be my brother and lawful guardian
to-morrow, and I suppose I shall have to accept his authority to a
certain extent. Then you will see what will happen." She was silent
for a few minutes, folding the Indian silk into the portmanteau, and a
slow smile spread over her face. "We shall have some fights," she said,
laughing softly. "But it will be worth while to fight with him."
"Elizabeth will never fight with him," said Eleanor.
"Elizabeth!" echoed Patty. "She will be wax--she will be
butter--simply. She would spoil him if he could be spoiled. But I don't
think he is spoilable. He is too tough. He is what we may call an ash
tree man. And what isn't ash-tree is leather."
"You are not complimentary," said Nelly, fearing that Elizabeth's
feelings might be hurt by what seemed an allusion to the bridegroom's
complexion.
"Pooh! He is not the sort of man to compliment. Elizabeth knows what
I mean. I feel inclined to puff myself out when I think of his being
our own kith and kin--a man like that. I shall have ever so much more
confidence in myself now that I know I have his blood in my veins;
one can't be so near a relation without sharing some of the virtue of
it--and a little of that sort ought to go a long way. Ha!"--lifting her
finger for silence as she heard a sound in the hall below--"there he
is."
Mrs. Duff-Scott's maid came running upstairs to say, "Please'm, could
you and the young ladies come down to the library for a few minutes?"
She was breathless and fluttered, scenting mystery in the air, and she
looked at Elizabeth with intense interest. "The major and Mr. Yelverton
is 'ome," she added, "and some other gentlemen 'ave come. Shall I just
put your 'air straight, Miss?"
She was a little Cockney who had waited on fine ladies in London, and
was one of Mrs. Duff-Scott's household treasures. In a twinkling she
had "settled up" Elizabeth's rather dishevelled braids and twitched
her frills and draperies into trim order; then, without offering to
straighten any one else, she withdrew into the background until she
could safely watch them go downstairs to the hall, where she knew Mr.
Yelverton was waiting. Looking over the balustrade presently, she
saw the four ladies join him; three of them were passing on to the
library, as feeling themselves _de trop_, but were called back. She
could not hear what was said, but she saw what was done, to the very
best advantage. Mr. Yelverton fitted a substantial wedding-ring upon
Miss King's finger, and then, removing it, put another ring in its
place; a deeply-interested and sympathetic trio standing by to witness
the little ceremony. The maid slipped down by the back-stairs to the
servants' hall, and communicated the result of her observations to
her fellow-servants. Mr. Yelverton meanwhile led Elizabeth into the
library, where were seated at the same table where Mr. Brion had read
his documents earlier in the day, three sedate gentlemen, Mr. Brion
being one of them, with other documents spread out before them. The
major was languidly fetching pens and ink from the writing-table in the
window, and smiling furtively. He seemed to be amused by this latest
phase of the Yelverton affair. His eyes twinkled with sagacious humour
politely repressed, when he saw the betrothed couple enter the room
together.
He hastened forward to put a chair for the interesting "client,"
for this one night his ward, at the head of the table; the girls and
Mrs. Duff-Scott grouped themselves before the hearth to watch the
proceedings, and whisper their comments thereupon. The bridegroom took
his stand at Elizabeth's elbow, and intimated that it was his part to
direct her what to do.
"Why should I do anything?" she inquired, looking round her from face
to face with a vague idea of seeking protection in legal quarters. "It
cannot make the least difference. I know that a woman's property, if
you don't meddle with it, is her husband's when she is married"--this
was before the late amendment of the law on this matter, and she was,
as one of the lawyers advised her, correctly informed--"and if ever it
should be so, it should be so in _our_ case. I cannot, I will not, have
any separate rights. No"--as Mr. Yelverton laid a paper before her--"I
don't want to read it."
"Well, you need not read it," he said, laughing. "Mr. Brion does that
for you. But I want you to sign. It is nothing to what you will have to
do before we get this business settled."
"Mr. Yelverton is an honourable man, my dear," said Mr. Brion, with
some energy--and his brother lawyers nodded in acquiescence--as he gave
her a pen.
"You need not tell me that," she replied, superbly. And, seeing no help
for it, she took the pen and signed "Elizabeth Yelverton" (having to
be reminded of her true name on each occasion) with the most reckless
unconcern, determined that if she had signed away her husband's liberty
to use her property as he liked, she would sign it back again when she
had married him.
And this was the last event of that eventful day. At midnight, lawyers
and lover went away, and the tired girls to bed, and Elizabeth and
Patty spent their last night together in each other's arms.