“Ah!—There’s to be a grand wedding at the old Hall to-night, Miss,” said the traveller.
“So I have heard,” coldly answered Drusilla, almost regretting that she had opened a conversation with this traveller, and wishing now to close it.
But the good man was well started on the great subject of the day and the place, and he would talk of nothing but the wedding, and to nobody but Drusilla, thinking, doubtless, that a lady, and a young lady too, would be most likely to feel interested in the theme.
Fortunately for Drusilla, her talkative fellow-passenger got out at the very next stopping-place.
Now, having passed the greatest range of the mountains, they were coming into a rather better settled portion of the country, and way-passengers were getting in or out at every post-house; and the theme of conversation with every one of these was—not the crops, nor the races, nor the elections, but—the grand wedding to come off that night at old Lyon Hall.
About three o’clock in the afternoon they reached the little hamlet of Saulsburg, consisting merely of a small inn and a half a dozen cottages, nestled at the foot of the Wild Mountain and upon the banks of the Wild River.
Here Drusilla and her attendant got out, in a pouring rain.
The kind-hearted guard hoisted his large umbrella, and led her into the shelter of the little inn parlor, and then went back to the coach to see to the removal of her luggage. He found mammy in high dispute with the porter—subject of debate, of course, “them there two little red morocky trunks.”
“Here they are!” said the guard, as the treasures were taken from the boot and set upon the ground; “here they are, blast ’em, and I’m blowed if I don’t wish I may never set eyes on you or your blamed trunks again as long as ever I live in this world.”
“And so I sees my little red morocky trunks safe, I shan’t tear the clothes offen my back for grief if I never sees you again; so there now!” retorted mammy, as she loaded herself with shawls, carpet-bags, and umbrellas, and followed the porter who carried the precious little trunks into the house.