If old Saint Nick had peeped into the dining room windows, he would have seen a merry company standing round the dinner table, gay with the crimson-berried holly and waxy mistletoe. At the head of the table stood Dorothy, appropriately and becomingly dressed in ruby-red velvet. On her right there was an empty place, and beyond it, old Doctor Winn, a boutonniere of holly in the lapel of his dinner coat; Mr. Bolton, Bill’s father, was next down the table, and just beyond stood Ashton Sanborn. Facing Dorothy at the other end, her father chatted with a bright-eyed Gretchen, who had Bill on her right. Next to Bill came Doctor Winn’s ex-butler, John Tunbridge, looking none the worse for his part in the mixup of the fatal night. Beyond Tunbridge stood Dorothy’s Uncle Michael, and then another empty chair.
“Just a moment, Dorothy,” said her father as she was about to sit down. “We’ve a surprise for you.”
“Oh, are there more people coming?” She indicated the extra places to her right and left. “I thought our party was as nearly complete as possible. Of course it would have been swell if Janet and Howard could have been with us.”
“Dum—dum—de dum!” hummed Bill, beating time with his hand like an orchestra conductor. From the drawing room a piano crashed into the opening chords of Wagner’s beautiful wedding march.
“Here Comes the Bride ...” sang the guests at table, and Dorothy’s heart skipped a beat.
Through the curtained doorway, walked a blushing girl, leaning on the arm of a tall young man. She wore a bridal gown of white satin, and her smiling face, below the draped tulle veil, was the exact counterpart of the astonished girl at the head of the table.
“Janet! Howard!” Dorothy ran to them and was caught in her cousin’s arms. “Where under the sun did you come from? I thought you sailed for South America last week!”
“That,” said Howard, grinning broadly, “is a surprise that Mr. Sanborn sprang on us the day after we were married. He persuaded me to give up the South American job and got me a much better one with Mr. Bolton.”
“Meet Mr. Howard Bright, the new manager of my Bridgeport plant,” cried Bill’s father, and everyone clapped.
“Why, that’s marvelous!” exclaimed Dorothy. “It’s only an hour’s drive over there from New Canaan. We’ll be able to see a lot of each other, Janet.”