"How silly you look, Jean, with your collar burst open."
The groom's enthusiasm had been too much for his toilet; the noon sun and the excitements of the marriage service had dealt hardly with his celluloid fastenings. All the wedding cortege rushed to the rescue. Pins, shouts of advice, pieces of twine, rubber fastenings, even knives, were offered to the now exploding bridegroom; everyone was helping him repair the ravages of his moment of bliss; everyone excepting the bride. She sat down upon her train and wept from pure rapture of laughter.
Pierre shook his head gravely, as he whipped up his steed.
"Jean will repent it; he'll lose worse things than a button, with
Lizette. A woman who laughs like that on the threshold of marriage will
cry before the cradle is rocked, and will make others weep. However,
Jean won't be thinking of that—to-night."
"Where are they going—along the highroad?"
"Only a short distance. They turn in there," and he pointed with his whip to a near lane; "they go to the farm-house now—for the wedding dinner. Ah! there'll be some heavy heads to-morrow. For you know, a Norman peasant only really eats and drinks well twice in his life—when he marries himself and when his daughter marries. Lizette's father is rich—the meat and the wines will be good to-night."
Our coachman sighed, as if the thought of the excellence of the coming banquet had disturbed his own digestion.
CHAPTER XV.
GUILLAUME-LE-CONQUERANT.
The wedding party was lost in a thicket. Pierre gave his whip so resounding a snap, it was no surprise to find ourselves rolling over the cobbles of a village street.