"And the dress, Arabella? Shall I help you make it?"
"That's what I was jist thinkin' about. I can't have it made at home, 'cause Susan an' Bella's in an' out every day. An' you can't have it here, for Jean an' the boys'll be home soon, an' they'd find out, an' if Lorry Sawyer was to get a sight of it, she'd remember all she's forgot. I was thinkin' on the way ever there's jist one woman in the village would make it an' never tell a soul, an' that's——"
Elsie nodded. "Mrs. Munn."
"Yes. Harriet dressmaked for a long time before Munn died; he wasn't no more use than Davy. An' she'd make it an' never tell. An' you'd help a little, wouldn't you, an' see that she made it—kind o'—jist a little—fashionable, Elsie?"
"Yes, Arabella; oh, yes." The answer was absently given. The girl's eyes were troubled. But Miss Arabella gazed at her in perfect faith, feeling sure she was evolving some new style for the fashioning of the blue silk gown.
"Elsie, my girl!" Old lady Cameron's soft voice, with its Highland Scotch accent, came from the foot of the stairs. "The minister's jist driving across the bridge. Come away down, and bring Arabella with you."
Elsie went into the preparations for Arabella's elopement with something of the feeling that she was assisting in a bank robbery. She suffered from a very anxious conscience the day she took the blue silk to Mrs. Munn. No need to tell that silent lady that the affair must be kept a secret; Mrs. Munn guarded everything that came her way as if it were a deadly crime in which she was implicated. She seemed not a whit disturbed by the astonishing fact that Arabella was going to elope. Such a method of getting married quite coincided with her general belief that things should not be talked about. She asked no questions concerning the prospective bridegroom, but promised to make the wedding gown entirely on faith, and if Granny Long found out she was making anything—well, she'd have to get a spy-glass as long as the sawmill smokestack!
Elsie had expected some advice and help from the elder woman, and felt disappointed and worried. The burden of the secret was beginning to weigh on her. Suppose she was helping Arabella to take a step that would end in life-long unhappiness!
She went slowly homeward, and sat down alone in her little room, sorely perplexed. She was gazing with troubled eyes down the lane, when a light came into them, and a little flush mounted to her cheek. A smart horse and buggy had turned in at the gate, and was passing below her window. The next moment Archie came up the stairs with a message. Dr. Allen wanted to know if she would like a drive.
She came down the steps clad in a long, brown coat, and a little toque with a coquettish bronze wing on it, the color of her hair. Dr. Allen looked at her approvingly. He had no smallest notion of the details of a woman's dress, but he knew that this one always seemed a wonderful harmony of color.