“Then the side aisle, if you please, sir. The middle aisle is reserved for friends only.”
He quietly took the place assigned him and waited. It did not seem real to him, the crowded church, the whispering people; all that seemed real was the horrible sense of expectation.
“Oh, it will be well worth seeing,” remarked a woman, who sat beside him, to her companion. “They always manages things well in this place. The last time I come it was to see Lady Graham’s funeral. Lor’! it was jest beautiful! After all, there aint nothing that comes up to a real good funeral. It’s so movin’ to the feelin’s, aint it?”
An icy numbness crept over him, a most appalling feeling of isolation. “This is like dying,” he thought to himself. And then, because the congregation stood up, he too dragged himself to his feet. The march had changed to a hymn. White-robed choristers walked slowly up the middle aisle; their words reached him distinctly:
“Still in the pure espousal,
Of Christian man and maid.”
Then suddenly he caught sight of the face which had more than once been pressed to his, of the eyes which had lured him on so cruelly. It was only for a moment. She passed by with her attendant bride-maids, and black darkness seemed to fall upon him, though he stood there outwardly calm, just like an indifferent spectator.
“Did you see her?” exclaimed his neighbor. “My! aint she jest pretty! Satin dress, aint it?”
“No, bless your heart! not satin,” replied the other. “’Twas brocade, and a guinea a yard, I shouldn’t wonder.”
Yet through all the whispering and the subdued noise of the great congregation he could hear Blanche’s clear voice. “I will always trust you,” she had said to him on Munkeggen. Now he heard her answer “I will” to another question.