For it was the morning of the ill-starred wedding—a morning in which Nature seemed to be in the mood to make everything depressing, for the wind blew hard, bringing from the Atlantic a drenching shower, through which, with Gellow for his best man, Glyddyr would have to drive to the little church. Meanwhile, he was having so severe a shivering fit at the hotel where he had been staying, that his companion had become alarmed, and suggested calling in the doctor.
“Bah! nonsense! Ring for some brandy.”
“And I’ll take a flask to the church,” said Gellow to himself, “or the brute will breakdown. We’re going to have a jolly wedding seemingly. Only wants that confounded Frenchwoman to get scent of it, and come down, and then we should be perfect.”
“That’s better,” said Gellow, after the brandy had been brought. “But what a day! What a cheerful lookout! I say, Glyddyr, am I dreaming? Is it a wedding this morning or a funeral?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, it looks more like the latter. I say: Young Lisle won’t come and have a pop at you in the church?”
Glyddyr turned ghastly.
“You—you don’t think—”
“Bah! My chaff. You are out of sorts; on your wedding-day, too. Hold hard with that brandy, or it will pop you off, and not Lisle. Steady, man, steady.”
“Gellow, it’s all over,” gasped the miserable man. “I shall never be able to go through with it.”