“In mother’s bedroom, then! We could easily get it to look like not that at all!”
“Yes, and Billy and Nancy standing up in the drawing-room together for all the people to look at and shake hands with, and kiss——”
(Here a sound as of the word “Pup-chick!” from the other parlourmaid, who was disposing the finger-glasses.)
“Yes, and showers of confetti dropping out of everybody’s hat for weeks afterwards——”
“And the band playing like anything all the time—all the wedding-marches and glides and rag time and all the waltzes that make you feel you must dance——”
“And a white satin slipper tied on to the back of the motor when they go away——”
“Yes! One of mine, so’s you can see it! Oh, won’t it be a gorgeous day!” trumpeted Theo, bounding up and down as if wire springs only held her to her chair. “Oh, why isn’t it going to be next week? Still, even this evening is almost as good as a sort of wedding-breakfast! Don’t you think so, everybody? With Nancy looking so sweet in that dress, and the way I’ve done the table, and the champagne, and everything? Only, in one way”—crescendo—“it’s better! Because, if it were the real wedding, the bride and bridegroom would be leaving us to-night! And as it is, they’re staying on,” concluded Theodora, with a peal of rapturous laughter, “and there’ll be no horrid good-byes to say, and no crying!”
“Won’t there!” came from the straight lips of her brother, in a grimmer and more deadly tone than even I had ever heard. “You’ll be crying, miss, before the evening’s over.”
And, to anticipate a little, she was.