Saturday morning was spent by Elizabeth sewing on a dress she was anxious to finish before Mrs. Hunter came, and when there were only mornings and evenings in which to sew, and inexperience made much ripping necessary, the work did not progress rapidly. As she sewed she considered. No, she would not give up the year away at school. It was absolutely essential that she come into the Hunter family equipped and ready to assume the rôle which a wife should play in it. She would be married without a whole new outfit of clothes, but the year at school was a necessity. Elizabeth’s pride revolted against being taught social customs by John Hunter’s mother. As she thought of the year he must spend alone, however, she was quite willing to give up teaching an extra year for the sake of the usual bridal finery. She resolved to tell him that. She would be married in the simplest thing she had if he wished.
Fate in the person of John Hunter himself took the settlement of the bride’s gown out of Elizabeth’s hands. Just before noon he stopped, on his way back from Colebyville, to give Susan Hornby the mail he had brought out from the post-office. Elizabeth followed him to the wagon when he went out.
“Well, I wrote mother. Can you be ready by October?” He spoke across the backs of the horses as he untied them, and was very busy with the straps.
Elizabeth Farnshaw’s face contracted visibly. He had taken advantage of her.
“How could you do it?” she asked indignantly.
“Why, I thought it was settled! I told you I couldn’t wait a whole year, much less two. I told you about getting Mitchell County land and getting down to cattle raising right off. You didn’t say anything.”
There was such righteous innocence in his voice that the sting of deception was drawn from her mind. The young girl made no reply, but leaned her head against the withers of the horse at her side and looked down at her foot to hide her tears. It was a blow. She was conscious that somehow there had been a lack of high principle in it. Her silence the night before had given some colour to the claim of it having been settled, but there had been a haste about this letter which was suspicious. Why could he not have stopped on the way to town as well as now on the way home?
The question which was forming in Elizabeth’s mind was cut short by feeling John’s arm stealing around her. She started and glanced at the house apprehensively.
“Oh, they can’t see us,” John said, glad to have that phase of the situation up for argument. “It wouldn’t matter if they did, since we are to be married so soon.” He added the last warily and watched to see its effect upon her.
“But I didn’t want it to be as soon as that,” the girl objected half-heartedly, making her usual mistake of laying the vital point of difference away to be settled in her own mind before she discussed it. Perhaps after all John had thought it was settled the night before; at any rate she would not speak of her suspicion till sure on that point.