It was a small wedding party, merely a handful of onlookers, chiefly teary women, grouped around the courageous pair, whose stanch "I will" woke derisive echoes aloft.
"For better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health . . . till death do us part."
The youngsters pattered the awful words so glibly! Then North's prayer went forth over their kneeling figures, they rose, took his hand an instant, and turned to face an applauding world. The watcher pitied them with a great pity.
Shelby followed North from chancel to vestry. The priest had laid aside stole and surplice, and stood meditatively in his cassock as the caller entered. Some men the cassock effeminates; not so North, whose virile shape it emphasized, modelling his muscles like an antique drapery. He seemed to radiate strength.
The canon remarked his friend's strained face, greeted him as if governors made a practice of popping into his vestry unannounced, and bade a negro, who was folding vestments, to finish his task later.
"What has happened to you?" he asked, directly they were alone.
"My wife has eloped."
North started at the bald announcement, but asked quietly:—
"Did she leave by the one twenty-five train?"
"You saw her?"