It was the next day that the Daily Evening News announced the engagement and the date of the marriage, which would follow within four weeks. Congratulations in number were bestowed upon Emmy Lou; they came by telephone and in letters from former schoolmates, but mainly they came by word of mouth from townspeople who trooped in to say the things which people always say on such occasions—such things, for example, as that young Mr. Winslow should count himself a lucky man and that Emmy Lou would make a lovely bride; that he should be the proudest young man in the Union and she the happiest girl in the state, and all the rest of it. Under this outpouring of kindly words from kindly folk the recipient was radiant enough to all appearances, which was a tribute to her powers as an actress. Beneath the streams of her happiness coursed sombre undercurrents of distress and perplexity, roiling the waters of her joy and her pride.
For nearly a week, with no outsider becoming privy to the facts, she endured a situation which daily was marked by harassing experiences and which hourly became more intolerable. Then, in despair, seeing no way out at all, she went to a certain old white house out on Clay Street to confide in one to whom many another had turned, seeking counsel in the time of trouble. She went to see Judge William Pitman Priest, and she went alone, telling no one, not even Mildred, of the errand upon which she was bound.
The wide front porch was empty where the old Judge spent most of his leisure hours when the weather suited, and knowing as she did the custom of the house, and being, for a fact, almost as much at home beneath its roof as beneath her own, Emmy Lou, without knocking, walked into the hall and turning to the right entered the big sitting room. Its lone occupant sat up with a jerk, wiping the drowsiness out of his eyes with the back of his hand. He had been taking a cat nap on his ancient sofa; his long white back hair was tousled up comically behind his bald pink brow.
"Why, hello, honey!" he said heartily, rising to his feet and bowing with a quaint ceremonial gesture that contrasted with and yet somehow matched the homeliness of his greeting. "You slipped in so quiet on them dainty little feet of yours I never heared you comin' a-tall." He took her small hands in his broad pudgy ones, holding her off at arm's length. "And don't you look purty! Mighty nigh any woman looks cool and sweet when she's got on white fixin's, but when a girl like you puts 'em on—well, child, there ain't no use talkin', you shorely are a sight to cure sore eyes. And you git to favour your sweet mother more and more every day you live. I can't pay you no higher compliment than that. Set down in that cheer yonder, where I kin look at you whilst we visit."
"I'd rather sit here by you, sir, on the sofa, if you don't mind," she said.
"Suit yourself, honey."
She settled herself upon the sofa and he let his bulky frame down alongside her, taking one of her hands into his. Her free hand played with one of the big buttons on the front of her starched linen skirt and she looked, not at him, but at the shining disk of pearl, as he said:
"Well, Emmy Lou, whut brings you 'way out here to my house in the heat of the day?"
She turned her face full upon him then and he saw the brooding in her eyes and gave her hand a sympathetic little squeeze.
"Judge," she told him, "you went to so much trouble on my account and Mildred's when we were still minors that I hate to come now worrying you with my affairs. But somehow I felt that you were the one for me to turn to."