These are the murmurs that fall from an admiring crowd, kept in check by an officious policeman, as they press around the awning that has sheltered the bride's passage. "Lor! if she oughtn't to be happy."
Unconscious of the comments, heedless of the observations, Lauraine is driven off to the fashionable church where her future husband awaits as sad and reluctant a bride as ever the martyrdom of Fashion and the exigencies of Society have sacrificed to the God of Mammon.
The bride's carriage has scarcely disappeared round the corner when a hansom cab dashes up, and is arrested at the awning. A young man jumps out, pays the cabman, and gives a startled glance at the carpeted steps, the gaping crowd, the unwonted stir and bustle around the house. He is not a wedding-guest evidently; there is nothing very festive about his appearance, but for all that he passes up the crimson-carpeted steps and into the hall, and there has an interview with one of the footmen, who, having received instructions on the matter, conducts the visitor into a small room at the back of the house, where sits an old woman with a snowy mutch on her head, and a stick in her hand by which she helps herself to rise.
"My lad, my dear young maister!" she cries, and he comes straight up and gives her a hearty kiss and a boisterous hug.
"How are you, Nannie? Why, you look just the same as ever, I do declare! Not a day older. So you see I've come back."
"And a braw welcome to ye, laddie," says the old Scotchwoman, looking up at the tall well-built figure and handsome face, with a world of love and pride and admiration in her dim and loving eyes. "Hech, sir, but it's strong and fine ye look the day, and none the worse for all the foreign countries where ye've stayed sae long. Aye, and it's proud I am to see ye back. Sit ye doon, sir—sit ye doon, and tell me a' the news. My auld heart's been just sair for word o' ye this mony a day."
"I will tell you about myself by-and-by, Nannie," the young fellow says impatiently. "Meanwhile tell me what's going on here. Is it a morning party, or a reception, or some new-fangled social rubbish? Where's Lauraine?"
"Miss Lauraine is awa' at the kirk," says the old woman gently. "Canna ye tell what it's a' aboot, dearie?"
"Church"—falters the young man.
Then the idea flashes across him, his bronzed face falls, an evil light comes into the blue eyes under the shade of their long lashes. "She's not—not married, Nannie?"