Pan-cakes and all were finally cleared away and the cake was cut, with many jests and much laughter. Dee got the ring, Annie the piece of money and Wink the thimble, thereby causing many a merry bit of banter from his friends. He came very near swallowing it, not expecting to find anything in his slice of cake as usually, by some miraculous juggling, the females get the things in the wedding cake.
I had not seen Wink since the night of the hop. He had absented himself from Willoughby, visiting various friends in Suffolk and on the Eastern Shore, and only getting back to the camp in time for the wedding. His absence had been somewhat of a relief to me. I did not know just how he would behave nor was I certain what my attitude should be. I felt that I must treat him as though nothing had happened; but if he was going to show hurt feelings or be silly, I knew I would get embarrassed and stiff.
I had not had a good look at him until we were seated at the table. Then, to my dismay, he was placed next to me. I knew it was up to me to be pleasant, so I waltzed in to be agreeable but not too charming. If only I could make Wink feel as I did! He looked different, somehow, but for a moment I could not account for it; and then it suddenly came over me that Wink was growing a moustache!
I felt like crawling under the table but instead I turned to the gentleman seated on my other side, no other than the next best man, and I am sure that Mabel Binks herself could not have got off a greater fire of small talk than I managed to pour forth. When I told Wink that he would have to grow a moustache before I could be sure of the state of my feelings towards him, I was not in real earnest and he might have known it! I was quite sure at that wedding breakfast what my feelings were: decided resentment. Why could he not realize that I was nothing but a little girl who occasionally played lady?
At any rate I was not going to let a little old moustache composed of a few struggling hairs spoil either my pleasure or my appetite. The next best man proved to be most agreeable and very easy to talk to, and the breakfast was good enough to occupy one without conversation had it been necessary to give your attention only to the matter in hand.
Wink looked rather ruefully at the thimble.
"You'll be darning your own socks 'til Kingdom Come," laughed Sleepy, glad that the joke for once was not on him. Wink sadly acquiesced, and then Zebedee kindly added:
"Maybe that means the kind of thimble Wendy gave Peter Pan, Wink. You remember in that delightful fantasy a thimble was a kiss."
"Well, anyhow, one can't wear a thimble and a mitten at the same time," muttered Wink so that no one heard him but me; and to my dying day I shall hate myself for the way I blushed. It was one of those blushes that hurt. I had a feeling that even my eyes were red. I had just taken the first mouthful of a wonderful molded ice: a pair of white turtle-doves billing and cooing, perched in the heart of a great raspberry sherbet rose. I choked (it must have been on the billing and cooing) and the next best man had to beat me in the back until I could get my breath. I was thankful for the choke and hoped no one had noticed that my crimson countenance had preceded the accident.
And now the toasts were in order. Everyone had to say something no matter how bromidic. "Long life and happiness!" "May your shadows never grow less!" And Dum blurted out: "May you have many more wedding breakfasts!" which caused a perfect storm of applause, as it sounded very much as though she meant marriages for the newly wedded couple. Mary Flannagan got off an impromptu limerick that amused us Gresham girls very much, because we were well aware of the fact that Miss Cox was very unconventional in her ideas and always irritated by narrowness in religion or anything else: