Then Lucy fell on her neck and cried and told her everything, and her
wonderful, unexpected, uncanny, adorable little aunt, instead of being
upset and making her feel too wicked and ungrateful to live, was full of
sympathy and understanding. They sobbed together, sitting on the sofa
locked in each other's arms, but it was a sweet sobbing, for they both
felt at this moment how much they loved each other. Miss Entwhistle
wished she had never had a single critical impatient thought of the man
this darling little child so deeply loved, and Lucy wished she had never
had a single secret from this darling little aunt Everard so blindly
didn't love. Dear, dear little Aunt Dot. Lucy's heart was big with
gratitude and tenderness and pity,--pity because she herself was so
gloriously happy and surrounded by love, and Aunt Dot's life seemed,
compared to hers, so empty, so solitary, and going to be like that till
the end of her days; and Miss Entwhistle's heart was big with yearning
over this lamb of Jim's who was giving herself with such fearlessness,
all lit up by radiant love, into the hands of a strange husband.
Presently, of course, he wouldn't be a strange husband, he would be a
familiar husband; but would he be any the better for that, she wondered?
They sobbed, and kissed, and sobbed again, each keeping half her
thoughts to herself.
This is how it was that Miss Entwhistle walked into the registrar's
office with Lucy next morning and was one of the witnesses of the
marriage.
Wemyss had a very bad moment when he saw her come in. His heart gave a
great thump, such as it had never done in his life before, for he
thought there was to be a hitch and that at the very last minute he was
somehow not going to get his Lucy. Then he looked at Lucy and was
reassured. Her face was like the morning of a perfect day in its
cloudlessness, her Love-in-a-Mist eyes were dewy with tenderness as they
rested on him, and her mouth was twisted up by happiness into the
sweetest, funniest little crooked smile. If only she would take off her
hat, thought Wemyss, bursting with pride, so that the registrar could
see how young she looked with her short hair,--why, perhaps the old boy
might think she was too young to be married and start asking searching
questions! What fun that would be.
He himself produced the effect on Miss Entwhistle, as he stood next to
Lucy being married, of an enormous schoolboy who has just won some
silver cup or other for his House after immense exertions. He had
exactly that glowing face of suppressed triumph and pride; he was red
with delighted achievement.
'Put the ring on your wife's finger,' ordered the registrar when, having
got through the first part of the ceremony, Wemyss, busy beaming down at
Lucy, forgot there was anything more to do. And Lucy stuck up her hand
with all the fingers spread out and stiff, and her face beamed too with
happiness at the words, 'Your wife.'
'"Nothing is here for tears,"' quoted Miss Entwhistle to herself,
watching the blissful absorption with which they were both engaged in
getting the ring successfully over the knuckle of the proper finger. 'He
really _is_ a--a dear. Yes. Of course. But how queer life is. I wonder
what he was doing this day last year, he and that poor other wife of
his.'
When it was over and they were outside on the steps, with the taxi
Wemyss had come in waiting to take them to the station, Miss Entwhistle
realised that here was the place and moment of good-bye, and that not
only could she go no further with Lucy but that from now on she could do
nothing more for her. Except love her. Except listen to her. Ah, she
would always be there to love and listen to her; but happiest of all it
would be for the little thing if she never, from her, were to need
either of those services.
At the last moment she put her hand impulsively on Wemyss's breast and
looked up into his triumphant, flushed face and said, 'Be kind to her.'
'Oh, Aunt Dot!' laughed Lucy, turning to hug her once more.
'Oh, Aunt Dot!' laughed Wemyss, vigorously shaking her hand.
They went down the steps, leaving her standing alone on the top, and she
watched the departing taxi with the two heads bobbing up and down at the
window and the four hands waving good-byes. That taxi window could never
have framed in so much triumph, so much radiance before. Well, well,
thought Aunt Dot, going down in her turn when the last glimpse of them
had disappeared, and walking slowly homeward; and she added, after a
space of further reflection, 'He really _is_ a--a dear.'