“Well, then, here! take this reel and wind off this hank o’ yarn, while I foot my stocking. People needn’t be idle while they’re talking. More idle time is spent talking than any other way—as if people’s hands and tongues would not go at the same time.”
Hugh obeyed with a good-humored laugh. At last:
“Well, aunt?” he said.
“Well, Hugh! Now begin, and tell me all over, all about it, for I don’t know as I understand it—quite!”
Hugh recapitulated the history of Captain Seabright’s illness and death, his last will and testament, and finally the embarrassment in which he found Agnes Seabright and the relation in which he stood toward her, concluding with:
“Now, what am I to do with her, aunt?”
“Marry her, Hugh. There is no home open to the orphan but this—nor this, unless you marry her first. You promised to wed her—you mean to wed her—why not do it at once? Will the marriage rite hurt or inconvenience you? Just let the marriage ceremony, which gives you a lawful claim to her, and which gives her the right to live here in this house as its mistress, and which will shut the mouths of the gossips for ever—be performed. ‘An ounce of preventive is better than a pound of cure,’ even in matters of gossip. Then bring her here to me. I’ll be a mother to the child. I’ll do the best I can for her. I’ll make her feel at home, and make her happy, even on this lonesome island.”
The next morning Hugh spent with Agnes Seabright. And after that he visited her every day, until the orphan’s tears were nearly dried and the maiden’s heart won.
For the reception of the bride Miss Joe was making every preparation which she could make without spending, or, as she called it, “heaving away of” money. Hugh schemed “to draw all points to one,” so that the marriage should take place upon the very day on which he was to sail for Baltimore preparatory to a longer trip to the West Indies. So, very early on a glorious autumn morning, while the rising sun was shining splendidly into the chapel windows, the marriage ceremony was quietly performed in the village church by the village parson.
Immediately after the ceremony was concluded Hugh tucked Agnes under one arm and Miss Joe under the other, and hurried down to the beach to get them on board the boat. He lifted Agnes into the skiff, handed Miss Joe after her, and, entering himself, laid his hand vigorously to the oar, and they sped down the stream and over the bright waters.