She and Miss Tuttle were amusing themselves again, brushing and combing over the old wigs, Leola trying on the sedate brown front, and Miss Tuttle the curly golden one, that certainly took fifteen years off her age, after Leola made up her sallow face with rouge and powder.
Then Miss Tuttle tried on Leola’s best gown, the dark brown cloth with the silk waist and loose jacket. The pretty brown toque was not unbecoming, with the double veil of white dotted malines, and Leola, who had never expected to smile again, had to giggle like a little school girl at the tout ensemble.
“Oh, Miss Tuttle, you will make a lovely bride! I am sorry I shall not have a handsome gift for you!” she cried.
“You will have given me the desire of my heart!” cried the governess, so seriously and gratefully that Leola laughed harder than ever, thinking she was certainly very easy to please, since portly Giles Bennett could fill the measure of her happiness. It made her think of the old adage Betsy, the cook, had repeated to her the other day: “Ever’buddy to deir taste, missie, as de ole ’oman said when she kissed de cow.”
However, it was very lucky for Leola that Miss Tuttle was so infatuated with the rotund widower that she was willing to win him by hook or crook, so her laughter grew more and more joyous as she added, merrily:
“Be sure that you put a little water in all the kerosene lamps about the house, so that they will flicker and grow dim.”
CHAPTER XV.
SURPRISES ALL AROUND.
Very dimly, indeed, burned the lamps among the floral decorations as the family at Wheatlands gathered in the parlor for the wedding ceremony, Jessie and her mother in full evening dress, though Leola had sent word down that she would be married simply in her traveling dress.
Outside the gates waited the brand new carriage, with prancing white horses, that had brought Giles Bennett and the Methodist preacher who was to perform the ceremony, and in the parlor the bridegroom waited, spick and span in his new black suit, for his bonny bride. Jessie Stirling, at the piano, had already begun the first low notes of the wedding march, and to that sound came Leola slowly down the stairs on the arm of Miss Tuttle, having peremptorily declined her guardian’s escort.