A brilliant June sun lay sparkling on tree and tower and over the roofs
of Wroxton and the downs which rise above the city. The morning might
have been ordered, like the wedding-cake, with _carte-blanche_, and no
expense to be spared. The promise of that first day of spring when
Jeannie had played golf with her fiancé was royally fulfilled, the
vigour and glory of the year was at its midmost. A light wind tempered
the heat of the morning, and set all the leaves of the trees chattering
to each other, and woke innumerable songs in the throats of the
lawn-haunting birds.
The marriage was to take place at two, and for an hour before people had
streamed into the Cathedral. The rows of free seats in nave and
transepts were full of the boys and girls of Jeannie’s classes, and the
combined length of feather in the girls’ hats would have stretched from
Bolton Street to the altar. Many of them knew exactly how to behave at
a marriage, and long before anything happened at all were crying
profusely into their pocket-handkerchiefs. This very proper proceeding
was interrupted with interested glances toward the west door, and when,
a few minutes before two, it was rumoured that the bridegroom had
arrived, the handkerchiefs were discreetly put away, for if you weep you
are apt to miss points of interest.
The choir was kept for the invited guests, who had come in enormous
numbers. A whole clan of Aveshams and Fortescues were there, and Colonel
Raymond felt it was quite a family gathering, and was conscientiously
able to congratulate himself on their appearance. The Collingwood party,
he considered, lacked that fine air of distinction which marked his
race, and the Colonel looked immensely interesting, and quite distinctly
caught the eye of a countess no less, who instantly looked away.
Among the women present there was only one dark spot of colour. In a
seat near the screen was Miss Clara. She was in black.
Weddings tend to be like each other. There are the same pieces on the
organ, and for the most part the same hymns. There is the same anxiety
to see how the bride behaves, and the same disappointment to find that
she behaves like most other brides.
Jeannie was perhaps a little different; she looked quite radiantly
happy, and not self-conscious at all; she said her own word very
audibly, and on the way down from the altar she caught sight of Miss
Clara, stopped the whole procession to kiss her in the face of the
assembled congregation, and all the Avesham contingent said to their
neighbours, “Who is that woman in black?”
Afterward there was a reunion at Bolton Street, and Collingwoods mixed
in a manner which did not suggest chemical affinity with Aveshams, and
each found the other just a shade trying. The bridegroom’s mother, for
instance, was, to say the least of it, puzzled with Lady Tamar, the
bride’s aunt, who smoked a cigarette with the whole of the close looking
on, and really did not seem to be aware how unusually she was behaving.
It was idle to explain, and Lady Tamar, on her side, at the end of the
interview, said to herself, “Poor Jeannie!” However, as neither knew (or
cared) what the other thought of her, there was no harm done. It was
lucky indeed that Mrs. Collingwood was not aware what the world in
general said about Lady Tamar; lucky also that Lady Tamar did not know
the innermost truth about Mrs. Collingwood! She believed that the whole
world was made to amuse her, and, if she had known, Mrs. Collingwood
would have amused her so much that her inextinguishable laughter might
have caused offence. Colonel Raymond alone, perhaps, was of all present
in the seventh heaven of bliss; he did not talk to anybody, but he
listened with both ears, and stocked himself with distinguished names.
He had an excellent memory and the Peerage. Thus his old cronies were
likely to hear more of collateral Aveshams.
Both bride and bridegroom effaced themselves from the party until their
appearance was necessary. They were to leave Wroxton by a train soon
after four, and the interval between their mingling with the party and
the last possible moment of catching their train was short. Jack held
that wedding parties were a barbarity, Jeannie that it was better not to
be a principal actor; and, as a matter of fact, they sat quietly in the
nursery and amused the baby till Arthur warned them it was time to go to
their train. For both there was rice and slippers, for each there was
the other.
The family who had taken Merton were in London, and were delighted that
the two should spend their honeymoon there. Merton was only a couple of
stations from Wroxton, and they arrived soon after five. All about her
were the dear familiarities of childhood, by her the crown of her
womanhood. Nowhere else, she thought, could Jack have known her as well
as here.
From tea till dinner-time they wandered about the place; like two
children, the one introducing the other to her home. This was the hedge
where the long-tailed tit built, and this the copse where wild
lilies-of-the-valley flowered in May. There was a reminiscence dear to
her, and infinitely dear to him, about every yard of the place. The old
boat-house with a leaky punt had given her many a Columbus voyage to
the island on the lake, and the clusters of water-lilies to surprised
eyes had been a Sargasso Sea. The punt was gone, but a newer boat was
there, and they rowed about for nearly an hour, and watched the quick
fishes in the water, and gathered the tall rushes and the golden-hearted
lilies, and together were rung to dressing time, as Jeannie in the old
days had been rung to bed. And as before they delayed to obey.
Dinner was over, and they sat on the south of the terrace-fronted house;
a full moon moved like a queen bee among the swarming stars, and the
world was refashioned out of soft darkness and ivory and pearl.
Pearl-coloured was Jeannie’s dress, and she the pearl of pearls.
“How strange one’s life goes in acts,” she said. “The act at Wroxton is
over now, but what a pleasant one it was. Oh, Jack, I hope this act will
be a long one. Do you remember the plank bridge by the mill, and Toby
shaking himself?”
“Do I remember?” echoed Jack. “Do I remember?”
“Only think, it is not a year ago,” she said. “And until then we had
lived without each other. What a pity we did not advertise for each
other before. It has been such a waste of time. Ah, there is the
nightingale; there is always one in the elms at the end of the terrace.
I remember how it sang all that night on which my father died.”
“It does not hurt you to think of that?” said Jack, gently.
“No, why should it? Life, love, death, the three great gifts of God.
‘What further can be sought for or declared?’” she quoted.
For a long time they sat in silence. The moon, still not yet in zenith,
shone with a very clear light across the lake, and made a pathway of
silver to the dim farther shore. To the right the nightingale trilled
and bubbled, a few lights gleamed from the great house behind. A spell
seemed cast over the world, and over the two sitting there a spell was
cast.
Suddenly Jeannie turned and laid her arm round his neck.
“You are happy?” she asked. “You have made no mistake?”
But in her heart there was no question, but utter conviction.
“God knows I am happy!” he said.
“And you, Jack, you?” she asked. “Do you know it?”
“You know that I know it,” he replied. “Is that not enough?”
And they rose and walked softly through the softness of the night back
to the house.
THE END
* * * * *
BOOKS BY E. F. BENSON.
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A Romance. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50.
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=The Law of Life.=
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=Place and Power.=
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throughout the book.”--_The World, New York._
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* * * * *
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=The Silver Poppy.=
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“The story is possessed of much literary merit, full of movement,
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“Worth reading for its own sake, on account of its deft and
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Mail and Express._
“A novel of first-rate dramatic quality in construction and style,
and its climaxes are worked up with fine dramatic art and spirited
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=The Career Triumphant.=
By HENRY B. BOONE, joint Author of “Eastover Courthouse’ and “The
Redfield Succession.” 12mo. Cloth, $1.50.
It is always an entertaining subject when the life of the Old Dominion
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“Should take a prominent place among the early autumn
books.”--_Boston Transcript_.
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* * * * *
BY A. CONAN DOYLE.
Uniform edition, 12mo. Cloth, $1.50 per volume.
_A DUET, WITH AN OCCASIONAL CHORUS._
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_UNCLE BERNAC._ _A Romance of the Empire._
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_THE EXPLOITS OF BRIGADIER GERARD._
_A Romance of the Life of a Typical Napoleonic Soldier._
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_RODNEY STONE._
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_ROUND THE RED LAMP._
_Being Facts and Fancies of Medical Life._
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_THE STARK MUNRO LETTERS._
Being a Series of Twelve Letters written by STARK MUNRO, M. B., to
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By FRANK R. STOCKTON.
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A Complete Posthumous Novel by FRANK R. STOCKTON, Author of “Kate
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as they came, to his secretary.”--_New York Sun._.\
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* * * * *
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=Richard Rosny.=
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OTHER BOOKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR.
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=The Silence of Dean Maitland.=
=The Reproach of Annesley.=
=An Innocent Impostor.=
=A Costly Freak.=
=The World’s Mercy.=
=Sweethearts and Friends.=
=The Last Sentence.=
=Four-Leaved Clover.=
=In the Heart of the Storm.=
=The House of the Hidden Treasure.= $1.50.
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=The Housewives of Edenrise.=
By FLORENCE POPHAM. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50.
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=God’s Fool.=
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