This place was gaily decorated with the aromatic boughs of the cedar, dressed with scarlet berries and crimson maple leaves. A table at one end held the wedding presents. This was the work of the Lauchie girls, too, for Kirsty felt it was nothing short of ostentation to put up to the public gaze all the fine quilts and blankets and hooked mats the neighbours had given her towards the furnishing of the new home. But the girls had their way in this as in all other arrangements, and most conspicuous in the fine array were a Bible from the minister and a set of fine gilt-edged china dishes from Captain Herbert's family.
And amidst all this splendour sat the bride, sedate and happy, arrayed in a bright blue poplin dress and the regulation white cap.
Beside her sat Jimmie, his arm about her in proper bridegroom fashion, but loosely, for Kirsty was not to be trifled with, even on her wedding day. He sat up, erect and stiff, strangling ecstatically in a flaring white collar, and striving manfully to keep his broad smiles from overflowing into loud laughter, for poor Jimmie's belated joy bordered on the hysterical. His magnificent appearance almost eclipsed the bride. He wore a coat of black, such as the minister himself might have envied, a saffron waistcoat, and a pair of black and white trousers of a startlingly large check. His hair was oiled and combed up fiercely, his red whiskers waged a doubtful warfare for first place with the white collar, his big feet were doubly conspicuous in a pair of red-topped, high-heeled boots which, unfortunately, met the trousers halfway and swallowed up much of their glory. But as both could not be exposed, Jimmie, evidently believing in the survival of the fittest, had allowed the boots the place of honour.
Scotty drove his grandmother over to Kirsty's early in the morning, for the bride said she must have her mother's old friend with her all day; and when he returned in company with Hamish, his grandfather, and Old Farquhar, it was almost the hour set for the ceremony.
The wedding guests had already gathered in large numbers, many of them standing about the door or in the garden—matrons in gay plaid shawls, with here and there a fantastic "Paisley" brought out, for this festive occasion, from the seclusion of some deep sea-chest; men, weather-beaten and stooped, in grey flannel shirtsleeves, showing an occasional genteel Sabbath coat from the Glen; bright-eyed lasses, with gay touches of finery to brighten their young beauty; youths in heavy boots and homespun clothing, gathered in laughing groups as far from the house as possible; and everywhere babies of all sizes.
Scotty left a crowd of his friends at the barn and went up to the house to look for Monteith. The schoolmaster had spent the preceding Saturday and Sunday with his friends at Lake Oro, but had promised Jimmie faithfully that he would not miss the wedding. As the young man swung open the little garden gate and came up the pathway between rows of Kirsty's asters he caught sight of his friend standing in the doorway of the new house, and gave a gay whistle. Monteith looked up quickly, but instead of answering he turned to someone inside the house.
"Here he is at last," he called, "come and see if you think he's grown any."
And the same instant a vision flashed into the little doorway, a vision that nearly took away Scotty's breath—a tall young lady in a blue velvet gown with a sweet, laughing face and a crown of golden hair overshadowed by a big plumed hat, a lady who looked as if she had just stepped out of a book of romance; a high-born princess, very remote and unapproachable, and yet, somehow, strangely, enchantingly familiar.
The vision apparently did not want to be remote, for it came down the steps in a little, headlong rush, casting a pair of gloves to one side and a cape to the other, and caught hold of both Scotty's hands.
"Scotty! Oh, oh, Scotty, dear!" it cried; and then it was no longer an unapproachable heroine from a story-book, but just Isabel; Isabel, his old chum, and something more, something strangely wonderfully new.