“You must take care of her,” said Mrs. Atterton, over her girl’s bent head.
“I will,” was all Andy said, looking straight at her; but some of the dearest and most sacred things in life passed in that unspoken conversation between Andy and Elizabeth’s mother, though neither of them knew it.
At last Mr. Atterton’s voice was heard in the hall, and he, in his turn, went through the same stages of surprise and anger and relief as his wife; and after that Norah and Bill did likewise, until, finally, some one had leisure to feel dreadfully sorry for the Stamfords. But it was Norah who went to the heart of that matter with a clear-sighted—
“So long as Dick’s all right, they’ll be all right. Don’t you worry yourself about that, mother.”
“But they wanted Elizabeth,” said Mrs. Atterton, wiping away a tear.
“Well,” remarked Mr. Atterton, “all I can say under the circumstances is, thank God they haven’t got her.” Then the memory of Dick’s perfidy roused his wrath again, and he muttered fiercely: “That hound—that hound—if he ever comes near me.... What did he get engaged to my girl for?”
Norah looked across at him with her odd little smile: “Look here, father, I believe Dick would have given anything to run away that night mother sent him to Elizabeth in the morning-room. I watched him going through the hall when he thought he was alone—I couldn’t make it out, then—but if ever a man was saying to himself, ‘I’m in a dickens of a fix,’ Dick Stamford did at that moment. Only after asking leave a year ago, before he’d even met the lovely Phyllis——” Norah broke off, leaving the rest to their imaginations, for she was nothing if not suggestive.
“It will be so awkward—such near neighbours,” sighed Mrs. Atterton.
“Why, mother,” said Elizabeth, “it will be delightful. Every time we see Dick and his wife we shall think how thankful we are, and every time they see us they will think how thankful they are, so the oftener we meet the jollier we shall be.”
And this was a point of view so in keeping with the sentiments of the Atterton family that by the time the guests had been informed by telephone and wire that the marriage would not take place, they all regarded the unpleasant part of the business as over and done with, and were ready for the next jolly thing. Probably no interrupted wedding ever went like that before, but then there are not many Attertons. And they were so tremendously glad that Elizabeth had escaped being unhappy.