Ada Winton was the lovers’ veritable good angel in those brief happy days.
“I am going to get up a hasty trousseau for the bride,” she said gayly, but with latent earnestness, and every minute she could spare from her work she spent at the cottage helping Aunt Susan to get Eva ready.
Ada was in mourning for her father, and in her trunk she had several pretty dresses, scarcely worn, among them her dainty white graduating gown.
With slight alteration the sweet white organdie fitted Eva as if it had been made for her, and it was the same with the dark-brown tailor-made suit, just the thing for the short wedding journey that had been planned.
“Oh, how can I take your pretty gowns?” cried Eva timidly.
“Say no more about it. They will get moth-eaten and old-fashioned locked away while I am in mourning. If it will ease your mind, you may buy my wedding gown when I get married,” laughed the brilliant Ada jestingly.
“I shall take the greatest delight in doing it,” cried Eva earnestly, feeling the weight of obligation thus removed from her mind.
How happily the days flew. To her and her lover that week between their betrothal and their wedding day stood out forever in memory like a beautiful gem in a golden setting.
They were not rich nor famous, but they were young and loving, with the whole world before them, and they asked nothing of fate but each other’s love.
So the golden days, love-freighted, slipped away and brought the fateful hour.