“Indeed it was quite an accident,” said Irma, who never would take credit for what she had not deserved; “you see, I did not know you, and I thought that one like my Lady Kirkpatrick was quite enough——”
“Hush, hush,” said the tall brown woman; “perhaps she means better than you give her credit for. She is a rich woman, and can afford to pay for her whimsies. Be sure she meant some kindness. But, at any rate, here comes the Advocate with our good Dean.”
We mounted into a curiously arranged house. At first one saw nothing but flights on flights of stairs, range above range apparently going steeply up to the second floor, without any first floor rooms at all.
Mr. Dean was a handsome old man with white hair, and he took our hands most kindly.
“My friend here,” he said, smiling at my Lord Advocate, “tells me that he has not left very much for me to do from a legal point of view. But I look upon marriage as a sacrament, and though the bridegroom is not, as I hear, of our communion, I have no difficulty in acceding to the request of my Lord—especially since our good Lady Frances has deigned to be present as a near relative of the bride.”
He called something into a sort of stone tube. Then bidding us to be seated, he went into another room to array himself in his surplice, from which, presently, he came out, holding a service-book in his hand.
We followed him down-stairs—I with Lady Frances on my arm, the Lord Advocate preceding us with Irma, whom he was to give away. He appeared to take quite a boyish interest in the whole affair, from which I augured the best for our future.
We were rather hampered at the turning of the stair, and had to drop into single file again, when Irma clutched suddenly at my hand, and in the single moment we had together in the dusk, she whispered, “Oh, I am so glad!”
Lady Frances told me as we passed into the little half-underground chapel, low and barrel-shaped as to the roof, with the candles ready alight on the altar, that all this secrecy had come down from the time when the service according to the Episcopal form had been strictly forbidden in Edinburgh—at least in any open way.
I cannot describe what followed. I must have stood like a dummy, muttering over what I was prompted to say. But the responses came to Irma’s lips as if she had many times rehearsed them—which perhaps was the case—I know now that she had always kept her father’s King Edward prayer-book, and read it when alone. We stood by the rails of what I now know to have been the altar. All about was hung with deep crimson, and the heavy curtains were looped back with golden cord. A kind of glory shone behind the altar, in the midst of which appeared, in Hebrew letters, the name of God. Irma, who was far more self-possessed than I, found time to wonder and even to ask me what it meant. And I, translating freely (for I had picked up somewhat of that language from Freddy Esquillant), said, “Thou, God, seest me.”