Senator Floud, despite Belknap-Jackson"s suggestion of himself for the office, had been selected to give away the bride, as the saying is. He performed his function with dignity, though I recall being seized with horror when the moment came; almost certain I am he restrained himself with difficulty from making a sort of a speech.
The church was thronged. I had seen to that. I had told her ladyship that I should ask quite almost every one, and this I had done, squarely in the face of Belknap-Jackson"s pleading that discretion be used. For a great white light, as one might say, had now suffused me.
I had seen that the moment was come when the warring factions of Red Gap should be reunited. A Bismarck I felt myself, indeed. That I acted ably was later to be seen.
Even for the wedding breakfast, which occurred directly after the ceremony, I had shown myself a dictator in the matter of guests.
Covers were laid in my room for seventy and among these were included not only the members of the North Side set and the entire Bohemian set, but many worthy persons not hitherto socially existent yet who had been friends or well-wishers of the bride.
I am persuaded to confess that in a few of these instances I was not above a snarky little wish to correct the social horizon of Belknap-Jackson; to make it more broadly accord, as I may say, with the spirit of American equality for which their forefathers bled and died on the battlefields of Boston, New York, and Vicksburg.
Not the least of my reward, then, was to see his eyebrows more than once eloquently raise, as when the cattle-persons, Hank and Buck, appeared in suits of decent black, or when the driver chap Pierce entered with his quite obscure mother on his arm, or a few other cattle and horse persons with whom the Honourable George had palled up during his process of going in for America.
This laxity I felt that the Earl of Brinstead and his bride could amply afford, while for myself I had soundly determined that Red Gap should henceforth be without "sets." I mean to say, having frankly taken up America, I was at last resolved to do it whole-heartedly. If I could not take up the whole of it, I would not take up a part. Quite instinctively I had chosen the slogan of our Chamber of Commerce: "Don"t Knock--Boost; and Boost Altogether." Rudely worded though it is, I had seen it to be sound in spirit.
These thoughts ran in my mind during the smart repast that now followed. Insidiously I wrought among the guests to amalgamate into one friendly whole certain elements that had hitherto been hostile.
The Bohemian set was not segregated. Almost my first inspiration had been to scatter its members widely among the conservative pillars of the North Side set. Left in one group, I had known they would plume themselves quite intolerably over the signal triumph of their leader; perhaps, in the American speech, "start something." Widely scattered, they became mere parts of the whole I was seeking to achieve.
The banquet progressed gayly to its finish. Toasts were drunk no end, all of them proposed by Senator Floud who, toward the last, kept almost constantly on his feet. From the bride and groom he expanded geographically through Red Gap, the Kulanche Valley, the State of Washington, and the United States to the British Empire, not omitting the Honourable George--who, I noticed, called for the relish and consumed quite almost an entire bottle during the meal. Also I was proposed--"through whose lifelong friendship for the ill.u.s.trious groom this meeting of hearts and hands has been so happily brought about."
Her ladyship"s eyes rested briefly upon mine as her lips touched the gla.s.s to this. They conveyed the unspeakable. Rather a fool I felt, and unable to look away until she released me. She had been wondrously quiet through it all. Not dazed in the least, as might have been looked for in one of her lowly station thus prodigiously elevated; and not feverishly gay, as might also have been antic.i.p.ated. Simple and quiet she was, showing a complete but perfectly controlled awareness of her position.
For the first time then, I think, I did envision her as the Countess of Brinstead. She was going to carry it off. Perhaps quite as well as even I could have wished his lordship"s chosen mate to do. I observed her look at his lordship with those strange lights in her eyes, as if only half realizing yet wholly believing all that he believed. And once at the height of the gayety I saw her reach out to touch his sleeve, furtively, swiftly, and so gently he never knew.
It occurred to me there were things about the woman we had taken too little trouble to know. I wondered what old memories might be coming to her now; what staring faces might obtrude, what old, far-off, perhaps hated, voices might be sounding to her; what of remembered hurts and heartaches might newly echo back to make her flinch and wonder if she dreamed. She touched the sleeve again, as it might have been in protection from them, her eyes narrowed, her gaze fixed. It queerly occurred to me that his lordship might find her as difficult to know as we had--and yet would keep always trying more than we had, to be sure. I mean to say, she was no gabbler.
The responses to the Senator"s toasts increased in volume. His final flight, I recall, involved terms like "our blood-cousins of the British Isles," and introduced a figure of speech about "hands across the sea," which I thought striking, indeed. The applause aroused by this was noisy in the extreme, a number of the cattle and horse persons, including the redskin Tuttle, emitting a shrill, concerted "yipping" which, though it would never have done with us, seemed somehow not out of place in North America, although I observed Belknap-Jackson to make gestures of extreme repugnance while it lasted.
There ensued a rather flurried wishing of happiness to the pair. A novel sight it was, the most austere matrons of the North Side set vying for places in the line that led past them. I found myself trying to a.n.a.lyze the inner emotions of some of them I best knew as they fondly greeted the now radiant Countess of Brinstead. But that way madness lay, as Shakespeare has so aptly said of another matter. I recalled, though, the low-toned comment of Cousin Egbert, who stood near me.
"Don"t them dames stand the gaff n.o.ble!" It was quite true. They were heroic. I recalled then his other quaint prophecy that her ladyship would hand them a bottle of lemonade. As is curiously usual with this simple soul, he had gone to the heart of the matter.
The throng dwindled to the more intimate friends. Among those who lingered were the Belknap-Jacksons and Mrs. Effie. Quite solicitous they were for the "dear Countess," as they rather defiantly called her to one another. Belknap-Jackson casually mentioned in my hearing that he had been asked to Chaynes-Wotten for the shooting. Mrs. Effie, who also heard, swiftly remarked that she would doubtless run over in the spring--the dear Earl was so insistent. They rather glared at each other. But in truth his lordship had insisted that quite almost every one should come and stop on with him.
"Of course, course, what, what! Jolly party, no end of fun. Week-end, that sort of thing. Know she"ll like her old friends best. Wouldn"t be keen for the creature if she"d not. Have "em all, have "em all.
Capital, by Jove!"
To be sure it was a manner of speaking, born of the expansive good feeling of the moment. Yet I believe Cousin Egbert was the only invited one to decline. He did so with evident distress at having to refuse.
"I like your little woman a whole lot," he observed to his lordship, "but Europe is too kind of uncomfortable for me; keeps me upset all the time, what with all the foreigners and one thing and another. But, listen here, Cap! You pack the little woman back once in a while. Just to give us a flash at her. We"ll give you both a good time."
"What ho!" returned his lordship. "Of course, course! Fancy we"d like it vastly, what, what!"
"Yes, sir, I fancy you would, too," and rather startlingly Cousin Egbert seized her ladyship and kissed her heartily. Whereupon her ladyship kissed the fellow in return.
"Yes, sir, I dare say I fancy you would," he called back a bit nervously as he left.
Belknap-Jackson drove the party to the station, feeling, I am sure, that he scored over Mrs. Effie, though he was obliged to include the Mixer, from whom her ladyship bluntly refused to be separated. I inferred that she must have found the time and seclusion in which to weep a bit on the Mixer"s shoulder. The waist of the latter"s purple satin gown was quite spotty at the height of her ladyship"s eyes.
Belknap-Jackson on this occasion drove his car with the greatest solicitude, proceeding more slowly than I had ever known him do. As I attended to certain luggage details at the station he was regretting to his lordship that they had not had a longer time at the country club the day it was exhibited.
"Look a bit after silly old George," said his lordship to me at parting. "Chap"s dotty, I dare say. Talking about a plantation of apple trees now. For his old age--that sort of thing. Be something new in a fortnight, though. Like him, of course, course!"
Her ladyship closed upon my hand with a remarkable vigour of grip.
"We owe it all to you," she said, again with dancing eyes. Then her eyes steadied queerly. "Maybe you won"t be sorry."
"Know I shan"t." I fancy I rather growled it, stupidly feeling I was not rising to the occasion. "Knew his lordship wouldn"t rest till he had you where he wanted you. Glad he"s got you." And curiously I felt a bit of a glad little squeeze in my throat for her. I groped for something light--something American.
"You are some Countess," I at last added in a silly way.
"What, what!" said his lordship, but I had caught her eyes. They brimmed with understanding.
With the going of that train all life seemed to go. I mean to say, things all at once became flat. I turned to the dull station.
"Give you a lift, old chap," said Belknap-Jackson. Again he was cordial. So firmly had I kept the reins of the whole affair in my grasp, such prestige he knew it would give me, he dared not broach his grievance.
Some half-remembered American phrase of Cousin Egbert"s ran in my mind. I had put a buffalo on him!
"Thank you," I said, "I"m needing a bit of a stretch and a breeze-out."
I wished to walk that I might the better meditate. With Belknap-Jackson one does not sufficiently meditate.
A block up from the station I was struck by the sight of the Honourable George. Plodding solitary down that low street he was, heeled as usual by the Judson cur. He came to the Spilmer public house and for a moment stared up, quite still, at the "Last Chance" on its chaffing signboard. Then he wheeled abruptly and entered. I was moved to follow him, but I knew it would never do. He would row me about the service of the Grill--something of that sort. I dare say he had fancied her ladyship as keenly as one of his volatile nature might.
But I knew him!
Back on our street the festival atmosphere still lingered. Groups of recent guests paused to discuss the astounding event. The afternoon paper was being scanned by many of them. An account of the wedding was its "feature," as they say. I had no heart for that, but on the second page my eye caught a minor item:
"A special meeting of the Ladies Onwards and Upwards Club is called for to-morrow afternoon at two sharp at the residence of Mrs. Dr. Percy Hailey Martingale, for the transaction of important business."
One could fancy, I thought, what the meeting would discuss. Nor was I wrong, for I may here state that the evening paper of the following day disclosed that her ladyship the Countess of Brinstead had unanimously been elected to a life honorary membership in the club.
Back in the Grill I found the work of clearing the tables well advanced, and very soon its before-dinner aspect of calm waiting was restored. Surveying it I reflected that one might well wonder if aught momentous had indeed so lately occurred here. A motley day it had been.
I pa.s.sed into the linen and gla.s.s pantry.
Mrs. Judson, polishing my gla.s.sware, burst into tears at my approach, frankly stanching them with her towel. I saw it to be a mere overflow of the meaningless emotion that women stock so abundantly on the occasion of a wedding. She is an almost intensely feminine person, as can be seen at once by any one who understands women. In a goods box in the pa.s.sage beyond I noted her nipper fast asleep, a mammoth beef-rib clasped to its fat chest. I debated putting this abuse to her once more but feared the moment was not propitious. She dried her eyes and smiled again.
"A prince in his palace," she murmured inanely. "She thought first he was going to be as funny as the other one; then she found he wasn"t. I liked him, too. I didn"t blame her a bit. He"s one of that kind--his bark"s worse than his bite. And to think you knew all the time what was coming off. My, but you"re the Mr. Deep-one!"
I saw no reason to stultify myself by denying this. I mean to say, if she thought it, let her!
"The last thing yesterday she gave me this dress."
I had already noted the very becoming dull blue house gown she wore.
Quite with an air she carried it. To be sure, it was not suitable to her duties. The excitements of the day, I suppose, had rendered me a bit sterner than is my wont. Perhaps a little authoritative.
"A handsome gown," I replied icily, "but one would hardly choose it for the work you are performing."
"Rubbish!" she retorted plainly. "I wanted to look nice--I had to go in there lots of times. And I wanted to be dressed for to-night."