"This is rather a squeamish business, Jack—" began the young minister in the negligée shirt. He was pulling on his coat as he made the remark.
"Oh, hurry, Jimmy; please hurry!" cried Marjory Brewster.
"Don't wait a second, Jimmy Bracken!" cried Amy Crosby, dancing with excitement. "You can't go back on them now!"
Three minutes later there was no Marjory Brewster, but there was a Mrs. John Ethelbert Barnes—and she was kissing her husband rapturously.
"Now, tell us everything," cried Mrs. Crosby after the frantic congratulations. The Reverend "Jimmy" Bracken, of the Eleventh Presbyterian Church, was the only one who seemed uncertain as to his position. In the first place, old Judge Brewster was a man of influence in the metropolis, from which all had fled for a sojourn in the hills. He and his daughter were Episcopalians, but that made them none the less important in the eyes of "Jimmy" Bracken. In the second place, Jack Barnes was a struggling lawyer, in the Year of our Lord 1880, and possessed of objectionable poverty. The young men had been room-mates at college. Friendship had overcome discretion in this instance, at least. The deed being done, young Mr. Bracken was beginning to wonder if it had not been overdone, so to speak.
"I wish somebody would tell me!" exclaimed Jack Barnes, with a perplexed frown. "The beastly jays shot at us and all that. You'd think I was an outlaw. And they blazed away at Marjory, too, hang them!"
Marjory, too excited to act like a blushing bride, took up the story and told all that had happened. George Crosby became so interested that he forgot to keep guard.
"This is a funny mess!" he exclaimed. "There's something wrong—"
"Hey, you!" came a shout from the outside.
"There they are!" cried Marjory, flying to her husband's side. "What are we to do?"