A Mad Marriage by May Agnes Fleming (mini ebook reader .TXT) 📕

picnic. It may possibly not last—but it is intoxicatingly delicious

while it does last, and little Crystal is ready enough to take the

glitter for purest gold. For Crystal—well, she is at her brightest and

fairest, too, to-night. There are hot red roses in her cheeks, a

streaming light in her blue eyes; her sweet, foolish little laugh rings

out in her joyous excitement. Even now, on the eve of her wedding, she

can hardly realize her own bliss. Surely it is the most wonderful freak

of fortune that gives this darling of the gods to be her very own

to-morrow morning at eleven o’clock. It is eleven at night now—twelve

more hours, and earth and all its powers will never be able to separate

her from him more. She lifts her little peach-bloom face to her partner

and talks and laughs. As a rule, she has but little to say, but she can

always talk to Terry, and never half so gayly as to-night. Terry is her

partner, and, whatever he may feel, no one outwardly is happier there.

Miss Forrester is not dancing. She is flitting restlessly about, here

and there and everywhere. The rooms are garlanded with holly, and ivy,

and mistletoe; glorious fires are burning, and in the dining-room a long

table is set out, to which the gay company will sit down presently to

toast the New Year in. No room is vacant; sentimental couples sit

spooning in spoony little nooks, go where you will. The vicar and Lady

Dynely, a portly dowager and Sir John Shepperton, the nearest magnate,

sit at whist. So the moments fly.

Presently France steals away, and leaving the hot, bright rooms, goes

out into the porch. It is a dazzling winter night; the earth lies all

white, and sparkling and frozen, under the glittering stars; the

leafless trees stand motionless, their black branches sharply traced

against the steel blue sky. Far off the village bells are ringing—bells

that ring out the dying year. One hour more and the new year will have

dawned. It has been a very happy year to the girl who stands there, in

her white dress and perfumy roses, and the new year is destined to be

happier still. Her heart is full of a great unspoken thankfulness, and

ascends to the Giver of all good gifts in eloquent, wordless prayer.

Presently the dancing ends, and, flushed and warm, the dancers disperse

themselves about, eating ices and drinking lemonade. Terry leads Crystal

to a cool nook, and Eric, his fair face flushed, joins them, and flings

himself on a sofa by his bride’s side.

“Lend me your fan, Crystal,” he says. “Look upon me and behold an

utterly exhausted, an utterly used-up man. Did you see my partner—did

you see that stall-fed young woman who has been victimizing me for the

past half hour? It was the most flagrant case of cruelty to animals to

ask that girl to dance. I saw her eying you, Dennison—there’s your

chance, old fellow, to take fortune at its flood. She’s two hundred and

fifty avoirdupois, and she has seven thousand a year, so I am told, to

her fortune. Go in and win, Terry; you’ll never have such another

chance.”

The young lady alluded to had sunk into a capacious arm-chair at the

other end of the room, her face crimson, her fleshy chest heaving, her

fan waving after her late exertions.

“You see her,” says Eric, “the sylph in green silk and pink roses,

quivering like a whole cascade of port wine jelly.”

“Yes,” answers Terry, looking at the shapeless florid mass of adipose

good-nature, with sleepy, half-closed eyes; “only, you see, it requires

courage to marry so much, and I don’t set up for a hero. How she does

palpitate—reminds one of the words of the poet: ‘A lovely being

scarcely formed or molded—a’—France, what’s the rest?”

“‘A peony with its reddest leaves yet folded,’” supplements France,

gravely. “Terry, what will you do through life without me by your side

to tell you what you mean? I am sent here to order you gentlemen to take

somebody down to supper. I suppose you’re booked, Eric, for the

green-silk young lady?”

“Not if I know it,” Eric answers, drawing Crystal’s hand within his arm.

“A lifetime of bliss, such as I look forward to, would hardly compensate

for another hour like the last.”

“Then you take her, Terry,” commands France, and Terry obeys, as usual,

while Sir John offers his arm to Miss Forrester, and Lady Dynely takes

the place of honor by the vicar’s side.

It is a very long table, and the party is not so large, even counting

the nine daughters of the house, but that they all find seats. For it is

not a “stand-up feed,” as Terry says, where every chicken wing and every

glass of wine is fought for � outrance. And then the battle

begins—the fire of knives and forks and plates, the sharp shooting of

champagne corks, the chatter and clatter of laughter and talk, of toasts

and compliments. The boar’s head that has grinned as the centrepiece

with a lemon in its jaws, is sliced away, raised pies are lowered,

wonderful pyramids of amber and crimson jellies are slashed into

shapeless masses, and lobster salads vanish into thin air.

The moments fly—the last hour of the old year is fast drawing to its

close.

“Ten minutes to twelve,” cries Lord Dynely. “Here’s to the jolly New

Year. Let us drink his health in the good old German way, to the one we

love best.”

He filled his glass, looked at Crystal, and touched his to hers.

“The happiest of all happy New Years to you,” he says, “and I am the

first to wish it.”

And then a chorus of voices arises. “Happy New Year!” cry all, and each

turns to somebody else. Lady Dynely stretches forth her hand to her son

with a look of fondest love; Terry Dennison leans over to her with the

old wistful light in his eyes. The vicar and his wife exchange

affectionate glances. France turns to no one; her thoughts are over the

sea, with one absent.

Then they all rise, and as by one accord throng to the windows to see

the New Year dawn. White and clear the stars look down on the snow-white

earth; it is still, calm, beautiful. From the village the joy-bells

clash forth; the old year is dead—the new begun.

“Le roi est mort!—vive le roi!” exclaims Lord Dynely. “May all good

wishes go with him.”

The piano stands by his side. He strikes the keys with a bold, skilled

touch, and his rich tenor voice rings spiritedly out:

“He frothed his bumpers to the brim—

A jollier year we shall not see;

And though his eyes are waxing dim,

And though his foes speak ill of him,

He was a friend to me!

Every one for his own.

The night is starry and cold, my friend;

And the New Year, blithe and bold, my friend,

Comes up to take his own.”

“My pale, my pensive France,” he says, “why that mournful look? The old

year has been a good friend to you also, has he not? As Tennyson says,

‘He brought you a friend and a true, true love.’”

“‘And the new year will take them away,’” finishes Lady Dynely, with a

smile. “An ominous quotation, Eric. Let us hope for better things. And

now, my little bride elect, as you are to be up betimes to-morrow, I

propose that you go to bed at once, else that pretty peach face of yours

will be yellow as any orange at the altar to-morrow.”

So it is over, and the new year is with them. The guests not stopping at

the vicarage say good-night and go, the others disperse to their rooms.

There is a farewell which no one sees between the happy pair, then Eric

saunters out into the white starry night to smoke one last bachelor

cigar, and Crystal is kissed by mamma and Lady Dynely and France, and

takes her candle and goes off to her room singing softly to herself as

she goes:

“You must wake and call me early, call me early, mother dear,

For to-morrow will be the happiest day of all the glad New Year.”

The morning comes, sparkling and glimmering with frosty sunlight, and

the vicarage is all bustle and gay confusion, a very Babel of tongues.

Nine; coffee—ten—dressing; eleven—carriages at the door, everybody

down stairs, and the supreme hour has come.

Up in her “maiden bower,” the bride stands robed for the altar. The hot

red roses of last night have died out, she is paler than the white silk

she wears. The chilly nuptial flowers are on her head, the filmy veil

shrouds her like a mist. Silent, lovely, she stands in the midst of her

maids, not crying, not speaking, with a great awe of the new life that

is beginning overlying all else.

She is led down, she enters the carriage, and is whirled away through

the jubilant New Year’s morning to the church. There the bridegroom

awaits her. The church is full; villagers, friends, guests, charity

children, all assembled to see the vicar’s prettiest daughter married.

There is a mighty rustling of silks and moires as the ladies of the

family flock in, a flutter of pink and snowy gauze as the six

bride-maids take their places. France is at their head, and divides the

admiration of the hour with the bride herself. As usual the bridegroom

dwindles into insignificance—the one epoch in the life of man when he

sinks his lordly supremacy and is, comparatively speaking, of no

account. Terry Dennison is there, looking pale, and cold, and miserable,

but who thinks of noticing him? Only France’s compassionate eyes look

at him once as he stands, silent and unlike himself, with an infinite

pity in their dark depths.

It begins—dead silence falls. The low murmured responses sound

strangely audible in that hush. It is over—all draw one long breath of

relief, and a flutter and a murmur go through the silent congregation.

They enter the vestry—the register is signed—they are back in the

carriages, whirling away to the wedding breakfast, and bridegroom and

bride are together, and the Right Honorable Lord Viscount Dynely is

“Benedick, the Married Man.”

After that the hours fly like minutes. They are back at the vicarage.

They are seated at breakfast, champagne corks fly, toasts are drunk,

speeches made and responded to. The bridegroom’s handsome face is

flushed, his blue eyes glitter, all his feigned languor and affected

boredom, for the time being, utterly at an end. By his side his bride

sits, smiling, blushing, dimpling, most divinely fair. Opposite, is

Terry Dennison, trying heroically at light talk and laughter, that he

may not be the one death’s head at the feast, but his face keeping all

the time its mute, cold misery.

The breakfast is over. The newly-made Viscountess hurries away to change

her dress. They will travel by the afternoon express to London—thence

to Folkestone. The honeymoon will be spent in Brittany—the first week

of February will find them in Paris, there to remain until the London

season is fairly at its height.

White satin splendor, nuptial blossoms, virginal veil, are changed for a

travelling suit of pearl gray, that fits the trim little figure to a

charm. From beneath the coquettish round hat and gossamer veil, the

sweet childish face looks sweeter and more childlike than ever. In the

hall below the impatient bridegroom stands—at the door the carriage

waits. She is trembling with