George Finch's wedding-day dawned fair and bright. The sun beamed down
as if George by getting married were doing it a personal favour. The
breezes, playing about him, brought with them a faint but well-defined
scent of orange-blossom. And from the moment when they had finished
the practical business of getting outside their early worm, all the
birds for miles around had done nothing but stand in the trees singing
Mendelssohn's Wedding March. It was the sort of day to make a man throw
out his chest and say "Tra-la!": and George did so.
Delightful, he reflected, as he walked up from the inn after lunch,
to think that in a few short hours he and Molly would be bowling
away together in a magic train, each revolution of its wheels taking
them nearer to the Islands of the Blest and--what was almost more
agreeable--farther away from Mrs. Waddington.
It would be idle to deny that in the past three weeks George Finch had
found his future mother-in-law something of a trial. Her consistent
failure to hide the pain which the mere sight of him so obviously
caused her was damping to an impressionable young man. George was not
vain, and if Molly's stepmother had been content to look at him simply
as if she thought he was something the cat had dragged out of the
ash-can, he could have borne up. But Mrs. Waddington went further. Her
whole attitude betrayed her belief that the cat, on inspecting George,
had been disappointed. Seeing what it had got, her manner suggested,
it had given him the look of chagrin which cats give when conscious of
effort wasted and had gone elsewhere to try again. A lover, counting
the days until the only girl in the world shall be his, will see
sweetness and light in practically everything: but George Finch,
despite his most earnest endeavours, had been compelled to draw the
line at Mrs. Waddington.
However, these little annoyances were, after all, the merest trifles:
and the thought, as he approached the house, that inside it there
sat a suffering woman who, thinking of him, mourned and would not be
comforted, did nothing to diminish his mood of overflowing happiness.
He entered the grounds, humming lightly: and, starting to pass up the
drive, came upon Hamilton Beamish, smoking a thoughtful cigarette.
"Hullo," said George. "So you've got here?"
"Correct," said Hamilton Beamish.
"How do you think Molly is looking?"
"Charming. But I only caught a glimpse of her as she was hurrying off."
"Hurrying off?"
"Yes. There has been a slight hitch in the proceedings. Didn't you
know?"
"My God! Tell me!" said George, clutching his friend's arm.
"Ouch!" said Hamilton Beamish, releasing the arm and rubbing it. "It
is nothing to get excited about. All that has happened is that the
clergyman who was to have married you has met with an accident. His
wife telephoned just now to say that, while standing on a chair and
trying to reach down a volume of devotional thought from an upper
shelf, he fell and sprained his ankle!"
"The poor fish!" said George warmly. "What does he want to go doing
that sort of thing for at a time like this? A man ought to decide once
and for all at the outset of his career whether he is a clergyman or
an acrobat and never deviate from his chosen path. This is awful news,
Hamilton. I must rush about and try to find a substitute. Good heavens!
An hour or so before the wedding, and no clergyman!"
"Calm yourself, George. The necessary steps are being taken. I think
Mrs. Waddington would have been just as pleased to let the whole thing
drop, but Molly became very active. She telephoned in all directions,
and eventually succeeded in locating a disengaged minister in the
neighbourhood of Flushing. She and Mrs. Waddington have gone off
together in the car to fetch him. They will be back in about an hour
and a half."
"You mean to tell me," demanded George, paling, "that I shall not see
Molly for an hour and a half?"
"Absence makes the heart grow fonder. I quote Thomas Haynes Bayly.
And Frederick William Thomas, a poet of the early nineteenth century,
amplifies this thought in the lines:
''Tis said that absence conquers love:
But oh, believe it not:
I've tried, alas, its power to prove,
But thou art not forgot.'