Harry still smiled at her ingratiatingly. "She's not going to marry him now, Rosie. She can't because, don't you see, she married me this afternoon!"
"What!" Rosie, feeling suddenly sick and weak, crumpled down into her chair, a nerveless little mass that gaped and blinked and waited for the world to come to an end.
There was a pause broken at last by an hysterical laugh from Ellen. "Don't look at me like that, Rosie! I should think you'd be glad I was married to some one else!"
Ellen's words brought Rosie to her senses. "I am glad!" she cried. "You never cared two straws about Jarge, anyhow! But why did you have to be so crooked with him? When he finds out the way you've done this, it'll just break his heart! I guess I know!"
Jamie O'Brien cleared his throat. "Rosie, you talk too much! Will you just hold your tongue a minute while I find out what all this clatter's about. Mr. Long, sir, will you be so good as to explain things?"
There was no smile on Jamie's face and Harry, looking at him, seemed to realize that it was not a time for pleasantries.
"I hope, Mr. O'Brien," he began soberly, "that you'll forgive me for not taking things more slowly. I expected to until this morning when Ellen told me about this Riley fellow. Then I sort of lost my head. I was afraid of delays and misunderstandings. I've been just crazy about Ellen. The first time I saw her I knew she was the girl for me and I came to town today to tell her so. I suppose she knew what I was going to say and down at the shop, the very first thing, she began telling me about Riley. Mighty straight of her, I call it. She had got herself engaged to him but she didn't want to marry him, and it just seemed to me that the easiest way out of things was for us to get married right quick. So we hustled over the river and got to the courthouse just before closing time. It was really my fault, Mr. O'Brien. I made Ellen do it."
Jamie looked at Ellen thoughtfully. "I don't believe you'd have made her do it if she hadn't wanted to do it."
"You're right, Dad," Ellen said; "I did want to. I didn't know how little I cared about George or any one else until Harry came along. George is good and kind and all that, but we'd never have made a team. I knew it perfectly well and I was wrong not to tell him so."
Jamie nodded his head. "You're right, Ellen. You've treated him pretty badly."