The Story Book Girls Part 60

She was talking to Isobel.

He walked straight up to her.

"May I escort you out of church on Tuesday?" he asked.

Mabel looked up in a puzzled way, then her eyes lit with shyness and something much more brilliant than had been seen in them for a long time.

"Yes," she said simply.

(Could he know how her heart thumped to that quiet "yes"?)

"Thank you."

(Oh, after all, after all, could the sun s.h.i.+ne after all!)

Isobel broke in coldly.

"I had understood from Robin that Mr. Symington would take Miss Meredith."

Mabel turned cold. She could not help it, for the life of her, she could not help it, she turned an appealing glance on Mr. Symington.

This he had hardly required, but it helped him to a joyous answer.

"Oh, no, Miss Leighton. Some mistake. I'm bound to Miss Mabel."

Elma strolled up. "It's all because of Cuthbert's insisting on taking Helen. Cuthbert ought to have taken Mabel. Mr. Clive takes the first bridesmaid; Mr. Symington, Mabel; George Maclean, Jean."

"Who takes you?" asked Mr. Symington.

"Oh, I'm not in the procession," said Elma.

"Yes, you are." Mabel was quite animated now. "The whole family trails out in pairs with somebody or another."

George Maclean strolled up.

"I shall take Elma," he said.

"No, you won't! You take Jean."

"I won't be taken by George Maclean," cried Jean. "He's always horrid to me."

"Wire for Slavska," interpolated Betty.

"Is this my wedding, or whose is it?" asked Isobel.

They settled everything once more. The real result lay in Mr.

Symington's determination about Mabel.

He came to Elma afterwards.

"Is there anything under the sun you want, which you haven't got?" he asked her. "Because I should like to present it to you here and now."

That cleared up things incalculably for the wedding. Elma sitting in front saw only Mabel, and Mabel's face was the colour of a pink rose.

Mr. Symington took her out of church after the wedding, next to the first bridesmaid.

Aunt Katharine followed them with her lorgnette.

"They're a fine couple," she said to Elma. "It's a pity Mabel spoiled herself with this Meredith man. Mr. Symington might lead her out in earnest. I always told your mother what it would be."

There was no squas.h.i.+ng of Aunt Katharine.

Mabel had begun to see land after having tossed on what had seemed an endless sea. She had been without any hope at all, but it was necessary to appear throughout as though she had some safe anchor holding her in port. The joy of delivery was almost more than she could bear. She became afraid of looking at Mr. Symington. After the arrival of the guests at the White House, she managed to slip out and disappear upstairs. Her own room had people in it helping to robe Isobel. She stole into the schoolroom. Too late of making up her mind, since Mr.

Symington, seeing a trail of pale silken skirts disappear there, tried the only door open to him on that landing. He found Mabel.

"Oh," said she blankly. "I wanted to get away--away from downstairs for a little."

He had some difficulty in replying.

"So I noticed," he said.

They lamely waited. Mabel caught at a window cord and played with it.

"We ought to go downstairs," she whispered.

Why she spoke in a whisper she could not imagine.

Mr. Symington came close to her.

"Mabs," he said, "just for three minutes I mean to call you Mabs. And after that--if you are offended--you can turn me off to the ends of the earth again. You know why I left before."

She bent her head a little.

"You didn't want me to go? You didn't want me to go! Say that much, won't you?"

She could not answer.

"I know what it means if you do," he said. "Oh don't I know what it means? Mabs, I'm going to make you care for me--as I do for you--can you possibly imagine how much I care for you--why won't you speak to me?"

Mabel never spoke to him at all.

He happened to take her hand just then, and the same confidence which had so strangely come to her a few days ago on his arrival, came to her once more. He took her hand, and time stood still.

Somebody outside, a vague time afterwards, called for Mabel. It dawned on them both that they were attending Isobel's wedding.

"We ought to go downstairs," whispered Mabel.

Her conversation was certainly very limited. They both smiled as they noticed this, a comprehensive, understanding, oh! a different smile to any they had ever allowed themselves.

"We will, when you've just once--Mabs--look up at me. Now--once."