"I want to bid you good-by now, dears," said the bride to the children. "You see there'll be a great row when you go to bed, and to-morrow morning I'll have hardly time to kiss you. So while they're setting supper ready, and he's talking to papa, I'll tell you each one of my old stories—no, you're so old now, Edward, that I'll tell Amelia two stories, and you can listen if you want to. Then we'll have just as good a good-by as if it were to-morrow, and two—no, three sets of kisses."
"But it's not so very far to St. Louis—so far as to make much of a fuss about; and we'll come and see you, sha'n't we?" said Edward stoutly.
"Yes, if I stay in St. Louis all the time;" and the poor girl told how often she would have to go down the river, and sometimes even across the ocean to Amsterdam. But presently she began on her stories, and the children at least were happy till they were all called to supper.
And then, to the surprise of the porter, the splendid Mr. De Alcantara took out a dried-up little woman whom he had hardly noticed, while Mr. Bryan and the bride filled up the table.
And such a supper as it was! Though it was past eight, the cook gave them as solid a first course as his French education would allow him before he covered the little tables with salads and ices.
To old Bryan's surprise, Hester took a little of De Alcantara's champagne—not as much as her cousins behind her; but he had never known her to take wine even in his flush times. Not that he cared,—he saw two full bottles opposite,—but yet he noticed it. Perhaps it was that which gave her rosier cheeks than she had had for a month; and perhaps it was that which put her in such good spirits.
"I am quite relieved," said she, as the last waiter went out. "I really expected to see a wedding-cake come on after this luxury, and hear that Mr. Prayerbook was in the next car, ready to marry me or bury me."
"If I had known you expected it," said De Alcantara, "I should have had it ready. And even now, I dare say, there is a priest on the train, my dear."
"Oh no, indeed," said Mrs. Goole, who took everything in earnest; "it will be far better for you to retire now with the children. It's nine o'clock, and just think how hard a day you'll have to-morrow."
"I don't know," said Hester. "I think that it is never so hard to do a thing as to make up one's mind to it; and as for going to bed, I don't care to. Perhaps Mr. De Alcantara has a pack of cards or so with him, and then you can have some whist, aunt, and we— Shall we have Sancho Pedro or euchre, your Grace?"