After that it wasn't easy. Judy joined him at the altar but he listened
to the ceremony with only one ear. With the other he tried to pay
attention to the voice which he alone heard. Since it continued and
since he was the only one who heard it, he concluded quite logically
that he was going off his rocker. Then maybe he _was_ being roped into
something--because if the prospect of marriage to Judy made him feel
this way, then maybe he'd better call the whole thing off before it was
too late.
Or had the strange voice put that idea into his head? Come to think of
it, here was a nice pleasant female voice. It didn't rasp like Mrs.
Wilkins' voice and it didn't hold the slight suggestion of a whine
dormant in her daughter Judy's.
"Do you, Edward, take this girl Judy, to be your lawfully wedded wife?"
* * * * *
Silence, except for a few sobs and whimpers in the sea of faces around
them.
"Do you, Edward...."
_Don't do it, Eddie. Do it and that'll be the end for you. You'd regret
it something awful._
"You think so, Miss, ah--"
_I'll tell you my name after you refuse. You'll find out a lot of
things after._
George wailed in Eddie's ear, "For gosh sakes, boy--you're holding up
the works! And quit that mumbling to yourself. Just say yes."
"_Hmmm_," said Eddie, cogitating.
"... And do you, Judy, take this man Edward--"
Apparently his _hmmm_ had been taken as an affirmative if nervous
response.
_You're right, Eddie--that's just what happened. Only don't let them go
on. In a moment it will be too late, and you'll be stuck._
"You think so, eh?"
"Shut _up_!" George hissed in his ear.
"... To have and to hold through sickness and in health, till--"
The wind came up so suddenly, and with it the clouds, that one moment
they stood in a bright sunshiny garden, the next it was dark and somber
and overhead lightning flashed and thunder rolled sullenly.
The rain came down in thick sheets from what had been a moment before a
wonderfully clear blue sky. Even George's composure received a serious
dent. "It just can't happen that fast!" he cried.