Hetty glanced at him shyly. “You will have very few dollars to spare, Larry, until the trouble’s through,” she said, “and you will be my husband in an hour or two.”
XXX
LARRY’S WEDDING DAY
Hetty was married in haste, without benefit of clergy, while several men, with resolute faces, kept watch outside the judge’s door, and two who were mounted sat gazing across the prairie on a rise outside the town. After the declarations were made and signed, the judge turned to Hetty, who stood smiling bravely, though her eyes were a trifle misty, by Larry’s side.
“Now I have something to tell your husband, Mrs. Grant,” he said. “You will have to spare him for about five minutes.”
Hetty’s lips quivered, for she recognized the gravity of his tone, and it was not astonishing that for a moment or two she turned her face aside. She had endeavoured to look forward hopefully and banish regrets; but the prosaic sordidness of the little dusty office, and the absence of anything that might have imparted significance or dignity to the hurried ceremony, had not been without their effect. She had seen other weddings in New York as well as in the cattle country, and knew what pomp and festivities would have attended hers had she married with her father’s goodwill. After all, it was the greatest day in most women’s lives, and she felt the unseemliness of the rite that had made her and Larry man and wife. Still, the fact remained, and, brushing her misgivings away, she glanced up at her husband.
“It must concern us both now,” she said. “May I hear?”
“Well,” said the judge, who looked a trifle embarrassed, “I guess you are right, and Larry would have to tell you; but it’s not a pleasant task to me. It is just this—we can’t keep you and your husband any longer in this town.”