“And I hope you consider me a friend indeed, Ruth,” rejoined the young fellow.
“I certainly do,” agreed the girl of the Red Mill with her customary frank smile.
“I—I am afraid,” Chess added, “that I am not considered in that light by all your friends, Ruth. Helen Cameron hasn’t spoken to me to-day.”
“No? Is it serious?”
“It is serious when a fellow gets turned down—snubbed—and not a word of explanation offered. And, in the words of the old song, we were ‘companions once, but strangers now’.”
“Oh, don’t mind. Helen usually gets over the mollygrubs very quickly.”
Chess turned to see the other Cameron twin eyeing him with no great favor.
However, the throng of guests who were invited to the reception began coming in, and for the next two hours the parlors were crowded with the many friends of the plump girl, who, as Helen had said, found this the greatest day of her life, and there was little time for much individual chat, though, it seemed to Tom, Chess Copley kept as close as possible to Ruth’s side.
It was after Jennie had gone to put on her traveling dress, and the immediate wedding party, who were to accompany the bridal couple to the dock to see them embark, were hurrying out of the room to put on street clothes that Tom, in a low voice, demanded of Chess:
“What are you trying to do—put a label on Ruth? Don’t forget she belongs to all of us.”