Mrs. Terhune wept.
“It’s a tragedy,” she said. “A wonderful girl like Mildred, and that wretched Will Mallet!”
“It’s certainly a pity,” said her husband; “but I suppose she knows what she’s doing.”
“Of course she knows, but she doesn’t care. She’s always been like that. I remember that once, when she was a little girl, she said she was going to make a birthday cake for her father. Well, almost as soon as she began, she hurt herself with a hammer, trying to crack walnuts. Her mother told me about it. She said the child was sick and white with pain, but she would have her poor little crushed fingers tied up, and she would go on. The cake turned out not fit to eat, and the obstinate[Pg 109] little thing was suffering so much that she had to be put to bed and the doctor sent for; but all she said was: ‘Anyhow, I made it. I did what I said I’d do!’ And that’s just the way she’s been about Will Mallet. She said she would marry him, and she’s going to. She’d wait—she’d wait forever!”
“Like poor Madama Butterfly,” said her husband. “Still, you’re obliged to admire that spirit. It’s fine!”
“Fine!” said his wife. “Not a bit of it! Devilish—that’s what it is. And when she’s married that scarecrow—yes, he is a scarecrow; I don’t care how handsome he is, he’s stuffed with straw—when she’s married Will Mallet, she’ll grow worse and worse. She’ll trample on him. It’ll do him good, but it’s terribly bad for her. If she’d had a real man like Robert Dacier, she’d have got over that. He’s the best-tempered, best-hearted boy in the world, but nobody could trample on him!”
Mr. Terhune respected his wife’s distress, and said no more. He couldn’t feel quite so strongly about weddings as she did, although he was very fond of Mildred Henaberry, and very sorry for her headstrong folly. He thought that on the whole the world was a pleasant place—especially on such a matchless day as this, the great climax of the summer.
They were speeding along smooth roads to the village where Mildred lived, and where the wedding was to take place that morning. The cloudless sky overhead was a brave, glorious blue, and the sun went up it like a conqueror. The grain stood ripe in the fields, the trees were at their best. You would think the countryside serenely quiet, unless you stopped to listen, and caught the ecstasy of sound from birds and insects all about.
None of this gave comfort to Mrs. Terhune. Her eyes were red when she alighted at the church, and she was glad, for she didn’t intend to look happy. She marched up the aisle and sat down in a front pew beside her husband. No one else was there except a rosy little girl in spectacles, and her mother.
Consulting her wrist watch, Mrs. Terhune saw that she had time to cry a little longer, and she was about to begin, when she was startled by the sight of her favorite nephew, Robert Dacier.