"You forget," I said, "that, at his first opportunity, it is possible for him to marry her! The risk is too great!"
"That settles it—come to the house and we'll get Leah!"
My hopes reached to the skies, then, and I was sure that I could conquer anything and everything that stood between me and the fulfilment of her rescue. With the surrender, she, too, gave herself up completely to the occasion. We took hands and raced up the lane like two children. In that moment I got a fresh glimpse of what sort of person Joy really was, when she was free. Edna's galumphing was not more gay and abandoned, Edna's laugh never rang out more merrily. When we burst into the house I think that Leah, for a moment, thought we had both gone mad.
We did not even wait for Uncle Jerdon to return with the carriage. I went out to see that my motor-car was in order, while Joy, laughing with Leah so gaily that I could hear them even from the stable, prepared for the trip.
Joy threw up her window, to call out: "Chester, I want that little chain Edna gave you! I must have 'something old and something new, something borrowed, something blue'!" I knew, then, that the last trace of feeling at that incident had disappeared.
She came down all in white—hat, veil, gown, gloves, stockings, shoes, parasol. Leah, too, was dressed for the occasion, modestly, as usual; for, though she could well have carried off a modish toilet, she always shrank from being in the least conspicuous, as if fearing to compromise Joy by appearing to assume a social equality. She was in a frock of ecru linen, just severe enough in its trim design to keep her place with Joy's bewitching laces and flounces and chiffon. I myself made a sorry-looking bridegroom, I fear, for I had found something to do under the belly of my machine, and the employment did the only costume I had little good.
So, bidding King good-by, we were off with enthusiasm. Even Leah had caught the infection of our high spirits—for a moment the tension had been let down all along the line. Leah had, indeed, much reason to be happy. She had implicit confidence in my ability to frustrate the doctor's plans, she saw herself now safe with Joy, she anticipated for her mistress a new beatitude. Under the influence of this, I noticed that she lapsed, for the first time in my experience, partly into a negro dialect. It was the more remarkable and significant because I had seen her under the stress of fear and horror, and neither had affected her speech. It showed me how rare perfect happiness had been in her life, that this glint of joy should break the bonds of her speech and unloose the tongue of her girlhood. Both Joy and I laughed freely at her, and she herself laughed with us.
We raced madly for the Harbor, sought the Methodist minister there, went into his cool prim front parlor, were introduced to his wife—who had that day enough to gossip about, I'll warrant—and the thing was done in ten minutes. Then we piled happily into the car and pelted home.
Joy looked at me with new eyes. "You've done it, haven't you?"
"You bet I have!"