Chapter 4

"Might have known they would do things up in shape somehow," grunted the Bishop's son approvingly. "This is the stuff. Conventionality be tabooed. They're going to the other extreme, and that's the way to do. If you don't want an altar and candles, and a high-mucky-muck at the organ, have a hay-wagon. _Gee!_--Let me get up here next to Ben Hur and the lady!"

Even the Bishop, sitting with clerical coat-tails carefully parted, his handsome face beaming benevolently from under his round hat, and Mrs. Bishop, granted by special dispensation a cushion upon the hay seat, enjoyed that drive. Anthony, plying a long, beribboned lash, aroused his heavy-footed steeds into an exhilarating trot, and the hay-wagon, carrying safely its crew of young society people in their gayest mood, swept over the half-mile from the station to the house like a royal barge.

As they drew up a chorus of "Oh's!" not merely polite but sincerely surprised and admiring, recognised the quaint beauty of the little house. It was no commonplace country home now, though the changes wrought had been comparatively slight. It looked as if it might have stood for years in just this fashion, yet it was as far removed from its primitive characterless condition as may be an artist's drawing of a face upon which he has altered but a line.

Mrs. Dingley and Mr. Horatio Marcy--a pair whose presence anywhere would have been a voucher for the decorum of the most unconventional proceedings--welcomed the party upon the wide, uncovered porch.

"We're going to be married very soon, to have it over," called Anthony. "But you may explore the house first, so your minds shall be at rest during the crisis. Just don't wander too far away in examining this ancestral mansion. There are six rooms. I should advise your going in line, otherwise complications may occur in the upper hall. Please don't all try to get into the kitchen at once; it can't be done. It will hold Juliet and me at the same time--all the rooms have been stretched to do that--they had to be; but I'm not sure as to their capacity for more. Now make yourselves absolutely at home. The place is yours--for a few hours. After that it's mine--and Juliet's."

He glanced, laughing, at his bride, as he spoke from where he stood in the doorway. She was on the little landing of the staircase, at the opposite end of the living-room. She looked down and across at him, and nearly everybody in the room--they were thronging through at the moment--caught that glance. She was smiling back at him, and her eyes lingered only an instant after they met his, but her friends all saw. There could be no question that the Juliet Marcy who, since she had laid aside her pinafores, had kept many men at bay, had at last surrendered. As for Anthony----

"Why, he's always been in love with her," said the Bishop's son in the ear of the best man, as in accordance with their host's permission they peeped admiringly in at the little kitchen, "but any idiot can see that he's fairly off his feet now. Ideal condition--eh? Say, this dining-room's great--Jove, it is. I'm going to get asked out here to dinner as soon as they are back. Let's go upstairs. The girls are just coming down--hear 'em gurgling over what they saw?"

Upstairs the best man looked in at the blue-and-white room with eyes which one with penetration might have said were envious. Indeed, he stared at everything with much the same expression. He was the soberest man present. Ordinarily he could be counted on to enliven such occasions, but to-day his fits of hilarity were only momentary, and during the intervals he was observed by the Bishop's son to be gazing somewhat yearningly into space with an abstraction new to him.

Nobody knew just how the moment for the ceremony arrived. But when the survey of the house was over and everybody had instinctively come back to the living-room, the affair was brought about most naturally. The Bishop, at a word from the best man, took his place in the doorway opening upon the porch, which had been set in a great nodding border of goldenrod. Anthony, making his way among his guests, came with a quiet face up to Juliet and, bending, said softly, "Now, dear?" A hush followed instantly, and the guests fell back to places at the sides of the room. Anthony's best man was at his elbow, and the two went over to the Bishop, to stand by his side. Mr. Marcy moved quietly into his place. Juliet, with Judith, who had kept beside her, walked across the floor, and Anthony, meeting her, led her a step farther to face the Bishop. It was but a suggestion of the usual convention, and Anthony, in his white clothes, surrounded as he was by men in frock-coats, was assuredly the most unconventional bridegroom that had ever been seen. Juliet, too, wore the simplest of white gowns, with no other adornment than that of her own beauty. Yet, somehow, as the guests, grown sober in an instant, looked on and noted these things, there was not one who felt that either grace or dignity was lacking. The rich voice of the Bishop was as impressive as it had ever been in chancel or at altar; the look on Anthony's face was one which fitted the tone in which he spoke his vows; and Juliet, giving herself to the man whose altered fortunes she was agreeing to share, bore a loveliness which made her a bride one would remember long--and envy.

"There, that's done," said the Bishop's son with a gusty sigh of relief, which brought the laugh so necessary to the relaxing of the tension which accompanies such scenes. "Jove, it's a good thing to see a fellow like Robeson safely tied up at last. You never can tell where these quixotic ideas about houses and hay-wagons and weddings may lead. It's a terrible strain, though, to see people married. I always tremble like a leaf--I weigh only a hundred and ninety-eight now, and these things affect me. It's so frightful to think what might happen if they should trip up on their specifications."

There was a simple wedding breakfast served--by whom nobody could tell. It was eaten out in the orchard--a pleasant place, for the neglected grass had been close cut, and an old-fashioned garden at one side perfumed the air with late September flowers. The trim little country maids who brought the plates came from a willow-bordered path which led presumably to the next house, some distance down the road. There were several innovations in the various dishes, delicious to taste. Altogether it was a little feast which everybody enjoyed with unusual zest. And the life of the party was the bridegroom.

"I never saw a fellow able to scintillate like that at his own wedding," remarked the son of the Bishop to the best man's sister. "Usually they are so completely dashed by their own temerity in getting into such an irretrievable situation that they sit with their ears drooping and their eyes bleared. Do you suppose it's getting married in tennis clothes that's done it?"

"Tennis clothes!" cried the best man's sister with a merry laugh. "If you realised how much handsomer he looks than you men in your frock-coats you would not make fun."

"Make fun!" repeated the Bishop's son solemnly. "I joke only to keep my head above water. I never in my life was so completely submerged in the desire to get married instantly and live in a picturesque band-box. Nothing can keep me from it longer than it takes to find the girl and the band-box. If--if--" his voice dropped to a whisper, and a hint of redness crept into his face which belied his jesting words, "you knew of the girl--I--er--say--should you mind living in a band-box?"

The best man's sister was the sort of girl who can discern when even an inveterate joker is daring to be somewhat more than half in earnest, and she flushed so prettily that the son of the Bishop caught her hand boyishly under the little table. He had hitherto been considered a hopeless old bachelor, so it may readily be seen that, now the contagion had caught him, his was quite a serious case.

X.--ON A THRESHOLD

When it was all over Judith Dearborn went upstairs with Juliet to help her dress for her going away. The maid-of-honour looked about the blue-and-white room with thoughtful eyes.

"This is certainly the dearest room I ever saw," she said. "Oh, Juliet, do you think you really will be happy here?"

"What do you think about it, dear?" asked Juliet.

"Oh--I--well, really--I never imagined that a little old house like this could be made so awfully attractive. But, Juliet--you--you must be very, very fond of Anthony to give up so many things. How well he looked to-day. Seems to me he's grown gloriously in every way since he--since his family came into so many misfortunes."

Juliet smiled, but answered nothing.

"And you're so different, too. Never in my life would I have imagined you having a wedding like this--and yet it's been absolutely the prettiest one I ever saw. That's a sweet gown to go away in--but it's the simplest thing you ever wore, I'm sure. Juliet, where are you going?"

"We are going to drive through the Berkshires in a cart."

"Juliet Marcy!"

"'Robeson,'" corrected Juliet with a little laugh, but in a tone which it was a pity Anthony could not hear. "Don't forget that. I'm so proud of the name. And I think a drive through the Berkshires will be a perfectly ideal trip."

Judith Dearborn was not assisting the bride at all. Instead she was sitting in a chair, staring at Juliet with much the same abstraction of manner observable in the best man throughout the day.

"Of course you didn't need to live this way," observed Miss Dearborn at length. "You could have afforded to live much more expensively."

"No, I couldn't," said Juliet with a flash in her eyes, though she smiled; "I couldn't have afforded to do one thing that would hurt Tony's pride. Why, Judith--he's a 'Robeson of Kentucky.'"

"Well, he looks it," admitted Judith. "And you're a Marcy of Massachusetts. The two go well together. Juliet, do you know--somehow--I thought it was a fearful sacrifice you were making, even for such a man as Anthony--but--this blue-and-white room----"

"Ah, this blue-and-white room----" repeated Juliet. Then she came over and dropped on her knees by her friend in her impulsive way and put both arms around her. The plain little going-away gown touched folds with the one whose elegance was equalled only by its cost. Anthony Robeson's wife looked straight up into the eyes of her maid-of-honour and whispered:

"Judith, don't put Wayne--and--your blue-and-white room off too long. You will not be any happier to wait--if you love him."

* * * * *

Drawn up close to the door stood the cart. Beside it waited Anthony. Around the cart crowded twenty people. When Juliet came through them to say good-bye the son of the Bishop murmured:

"Er--Mrs. Robeson----"

"Yes, Mr. Farnham----" said Juliet promptly, her delicate flush answering the name, as it had answered it many times that day.

"When are you going to be at home to your friends?"

"The fifteenth day of October," said Juliet. "And from then on, every day in the week, every week in the year. Come and see us--everybody. But don't expect any formal invitations."

"I'll be down," declared the Bishop's son. "I'll be down once a week."

"Please don't stay long after we are gone," requested Anthony, putting his bride into the cart and springing in beside her. He gathered up the reins. "Good-bye," he called. "Take this next train home. It goes in an hour. Lock the door, Carey, and hang the key up in plain sight by the window there. We live in the country now, and that's the way we do. Good-bye--good-bye!"

Then he drove rapidly away down the road.

"And that pair," said the son of the Bishop gravely, looking after them and speaking to the company in general, "married, so to speak, in a hay-wagon, and going for a wedding trip in a wheel-barrow through the Berkshires, is Juliet Marcy and Anthony Robeson."

"No, my son," said the Bishop slowly--and everybody always listened when the Bishop spoke: "It is Anthony and Juliet Robeson--and that makes all the difference. I think two happier young people I never married. And may God be with them."

The best man said that he and the maid-of-honour would walk the half-mile to the station. The son of the Bishop and the sister of the best man had already taken this course without saying anything about it. Nearly everybody murmured something about it being a lovely evening and a glorious sunset and a charming road, and, pairing off advisedly, adopted the same plan. The Bishop and Mrs. Bishop, Mrs. Dingley and Mr. Marcy decided on being driven over to the station in a light surrey provided for this anticipated emergency.

The best man and the maid-of-honour succeeded in dropping behind the rest of the pedestrians. Their friends were used to that, and let them mercifully alone.

"Mighty pretty affair," observed Carey in a melancholy tone.

"Yes--in its way," admitted Judith Dearborn with apparent reluctance.

"Cosy house."

"Very."

"Tony seemed happy."

"Ecstatic." Judith's inflection was peculiar.

"Nobody would have suspected Juliet of feeling blue about living off here."

"She doesn't seem to."

"What's made the difference?"

"Anthony Robeson, probably."

"Must seem pretty good to him to have her care like that."

"I presume so."

"It isn't everybody that could inspire such an--affection--in such a girl."

"No, indeed."

Carey looked intensely gloomy. The two walked on in silence, Miss Dearborn studying the sunset, Carey studying Miss Dearborn. Suddenly he spoke again.

"Judith, do all our plans for the future seem as desirable to you as they did this morning?"

"Which ones?"

"Apartment in the locality we've picked out--life in the style the locality calls for--and _wait_ for it all until I'm _gray_----" with a burst of tremendous energy. "Good heavens, darling, what's the use? Why--if I could have you and a little home like that----"

He bit his lip hard. The maid-of-honour walked on, her head turned still farther away than before. They were nearing the station. Just ahead lay a turn in the road--the last turn. The rest of the party, with a shout back at this dilatory pair, disappeared around it. From the distance came the long, shrill whistle of the approaching train.

The maid-of-honour glanced behind: there was not a soul in sight; ahead: and saw nothing to alarm a girl with an impulse in her heart. At a point where great masses of reddening sumac hid a little dip in the road from everything earthly she stopped suddenly, and turning, put out both hands. She looked up into a face which warmed on the instant into a half-incredulous joy and said very gently: "You may."

* * * * *

The sun had been gone only two hours, and the soft early autumn darkness had but lately settled down upon the silent little house, waiting alone for its owners to come back some October day, when a cart, driven slowly, rolled along the road. In front of the house it stopped.

"Where are we?" asked Juliet's voice. "This is a private house. I thought we--Why, Tony--do you see?--We've come around in a circle instead of going on to that little inn you spoke of. This is--_home_!"

"Is it?" said Anthony's voice in a tone of great surprise. "So it is!" He leaped out and came around to Juliet's side. "What a fluke!" But the happy laugh in his voice betrayed him.

"Anthony Robeson," cried Juliet softly, "you need not pretend to be surprised. You meant to do it."

"Did I?" He reached out both arms to take her down. "Perhaps I did. Do you mind--Mrs. Robeson? Shall we go on?"

Juliet looked down at him. "No, I don't think I mind," she said.

He swung her down, and they went slowly up the walk. "Somehow," said Anthony Robeson, looking up at the house, lying as if asleep in the September night, "when I thought of taking you to that little public inn, and then remembered that we might have this instead--We can go on with our wedding journey to-morrow, dear-but--to-night----"

He led her silently upon the porch. He found the key, where in jest he had bade his best man put it, and unlocked the door and threw it open.

He stepped first upon the threshold, and, turning, held out his arms.

"Come," he said, smiling in the darkness.

XI.--A BACHELOR AT DINNER

"Hallo there--Anthony Robeson--don't be in such a hurry you can't notice a fellow."

The big figure rushing through the snow paused, wheeled, and thrust out a hand of hearty greeting. "That you, Carey? Hat over your eyes like a train robber--electric lights all behind you--and you expect me to smile at you as I go by! How are you? How's Judith?"

"Infernally lonely--I mean I am--Judith's off on a visit to her mother. Say, Tony--take me home with you--will you? I want some decent things to eat, so I'm holding you up on purpose."

"Good--come on. Train goes in a few minutes. Juliet will be delighted."

The two hurried on together into the station from which the suburban trains were constantly leaving. As they entered they encountered a mutual friend, at whom both flung themselves enthusiastically with alternate greetings:

"Roger Barnes----"

"Roger--old fellow--glad to see you back!"

"Patient safely landed?"

"Get a big fee?"

"Where you going?"

"Let's take him home with us, Tony----" The third man looked smiling at Tony. "I'll challenge you to," said he.

"That's easy--come on," responded Anthony Robeson with cordiality. "I'll just telephone Mrs. Robeson."

"That's it," said Dr. Roger Barnes. "You don't dare not to. I understand. Go ahead. But if she's too much dashed let me know, will you?"

Anthony turned, laughing, into a telephone closet, from which he emerged in time to catch his train with his guests.

"It's all right," he assured them. "But it's only fair to let her know a few minutes ahead. You like to understand, Roger, before you start, don't you, whether your emergency case is a hip-fracture or a cut lip, so you can tell whether to take your glue or your sewing-silk?"

"By all means," said the bachelor of the party. "And I suppose you think Mrs. Juliet Marcy Robeson is now smiling happily to herself over this little surprise. I'll lay you anything you please that if I can make her own up she'll admit that she said '_Merciful heavens!_' into the telephone when she got your message."

Anthony shook his head. "Evidently you don't know what guests in the remote suburbs on a stormy February night mean to a poor girl whose nearest neighbour is five hundred feet away. Your ideas of married life need a little freshening, too. They're pretty antique."

It was a half-mile from the station to the house--the "box of a house"--which had been Anthony's home for five months, and toward which he now led his friends with the air of a man about to show his most treasured possessions. He strode through the deepening snow as if he enjoyed the strenuous tramp, setting a pace which Wayne Carey, with his office life, if not the doctor, more vigorously built and bred, found difficult to maintain.

"Here we are," called the leader, pointing toward windows glowing with a ruddy light. The doctor looked up with interest. Carey was a frequent visitor, but the busy surgeon, old school-and-college chum of Anthony's though he was, was about to have his first introduction to a place of which he had heard much, but of whose nearness to Paradise he doubted with the strong skepticism of a man who has seen many a fair beginning end in all unhappiness and desolation.

As they stamped upon the little porch the door flew open, the brilliancy and comfort of a fire-and-lamplit room leaped out at them, a delicious faint odour of cookery assailed their hungry nostrils, and the welcome which makes all worth having met them on the threshold.

"Wayne," said the rich young voice of the mistress of the house, "I'm so glad. Roger Barnes, this is just downright good of you; it's so long you've promised us this. Tony----"

What she said to Tony must have been whispered in his ear if voiced at all, for the two guests, looking on with laughing, envious eyes, saw their hostess swept unceremoniously into a bearlike embrace, swung into the air as one thrusts up a child, poised there an instant, laughing and protesting, then slowly lowered to be kissed, and set down once more lightly upon the floor.

"It's all right. I didn't tumble your hair a bit," said Anthony coolly. "Excuse me, gentlemen, but Wayne understands--and Roger will some day, I hope--that a man who has been thinking about it all the way home can't put it off on account of a couple of idiots who stand and stare instead of politely turning their backs. Oh, don't mention it--it doesn't disturb me at all; and Mrs. Robeson is becoming reconciled to my impetuosity by degrees. Make yourselves at home, boys. Juliet----"

"Take them upstairs, Tony, please. Of course we can't let them go back to-night, now we have them. It's beginning to storm heavily, isn't it? I thought so. Take them to the guest-room, Tony--and dinner will be served as soon as you are down."

* * * * *

"By Jupiter, I believe she means it," declared the doctor, with approval, as the door of the bedroom closed on his host. "I think I can tell when a woman is shamming. She's improved, hasn't she, tremendously? Pretty girl always, but--well--bloomed now. Nice little house. Believe I'll have to stay, though I ought not--just to take observations on Tony. His enthusiasm has all the appearance of reality. In fact, it strikes me he has rather----"

It was on his lips to say "rather more than you have," but it occurred to him in time that jokes on this ground are dangerous. Wayne Carey had been married in November, was living in a somewhat unpretentious way in a downtown boarding-house, and certainly had to-night so much of a lost-dog air that it made the doctor pause. So he substituted: "--rather more than I should have expected, even of a fellow who has got the girl he has wanted all his life," and fell to washing and brushing vigorously, eyeing meanwhile the little room with a critical bachelor's appreciation of beauty and comfort in the quarters he is to occupy. It was very simply furnished, certainly, but it struck him as a place where his dreams were likely to be pleasant for every reason in the world.

Downstairs, Juliet, in the dining-room, was surveying her table with the hostess's satisfaction. Opposite her stood a tall and slender girl, black-haired, black-eyed, with a face of great attractiveness.

"I wish, Mrs. Robeson," she was saying eagerly, "you would let me serve you as your maid, and not make a guest of me. Really, I should love to do it. I don't need to meet your friends, and I don't mind seeming what I really am--your----"

"Rachel Redding," Juliet interrupted, lifting an affectionate glance across the table, "if you want to seem what you really are--my friend--you will let me do as I like."

"My shabby clothes----" murmured the girl.

"If I could look as much like a princess as you do in them----"

"Mrs. Robeson, in that lovely dull red you're a queen----"

"--dowager," finished Juliet gayly. "Well, I'll be proud of you, and you can be proud of me, if you like, and together we'll make those hungry men think there's nothing like us. The dinner's the thing. Isn't it the luckiest chance in the world I sent for those oysters this morning? Doctor Barnes is perfectly fine, but he never would believe in the happiness of married life if the coffee were poor or the beefsteak too much broiled. Doesn't the table look pretty? Those red geranium blossoms you brought me give it just the gay touch it needed this winter night."

* * * * *