Part 27 (2/2)
”I was not the impulsive one this time, though, Bobby,” Judy declared when they finally settled themselves around the luncheon table at the hotel where a second bridal feast had been prepared, ordered by the lavish Bobby. ”It was Kent. I had no idea of ever being married--in fact, it seemed to me to be not quite decent to be married so quickly when I was in such deep mourning--The wedding was quiet because of the recent bereavement----”
”In mourning! You, Judy, in mourning for whom?” and poor little Mrs.
Kean gasped, not knowing what she was to learn now.
”Why, for Kent himself. Nothing but the bombs dropped in Paris kept me from having my best serge suit dyed black. Molly, I always said I'd make a fetching widow, and I did all right. Kent thought I was just lovely in the hat I fixed for his mourning.”
”Oh, Judy! The same old Judy!” exclaimed Molly fondly.
Molly had thought it would be impossible for her to go to New York to meet the incoming steamer with its precious cargo, but Edwin had declared she should go; so little Mildred was taken on the jaunt as well, with the eager Katy as nurse. Kizzie was already installed as cook and Katy was proving a most careful and reliable nurse. Molly was looking and behaving more like herself and no longer had to let her patient husband go off to his lectures like a bachelor with no wife to pour his coffee.
”And now, you and Kent and Mr. and Mrs. Kean must all come to Wellington to visit us,” announced the hospitable Molly. ”Mustn't they, Edwin?”
”Indeed they must,” said Edwin obediently, but in his heart wondering where Molly would put all of them. The old red house on the campus was large but had not very many rooms. The young professor could never quite get used to the Browns and their unbounded hospitality. His favorite story was one on his mother-in-law; how, when one of her sons brought home the whole football team to spend the night, she calmly took the top mattresses off all the beds (the beds at Chatsworth were fortunately equipped with box mattresses and top mattresses) and made up pallets on the floor, thereby doubling the sleeping capacity of her hospitable mansion.
”I can't come, Molly,--mighty sorry,” said Kent, ”but my job must be held down now. They have kept it open for me long enough.”
”And I stay with Kent!” declared Judy.
”Hurrah, hurrah! Her mother's own daughter!” cried the delighted Bobby.
”I was wondering what kind of wife my girl would make; now I know. I wouldn't take anything for that: 'I stay with Kent.'”
”Oh, I'm going to be terribly domestic. I found that out while I was living with the Tricots. What's more, I can make tarts--the best ever. I can hardly wait to get a flat and a pastry board to make some for Kent.”
”You might use your drawing board for a pastry board,” teased her father. ”I fancy art is through with.”
”Through with, indeed! Why, Bobby, I am astonished and ashamed of you! I am going to paint all the time that I am not making tarts, and what time is left, I am going to knit socks and make bandages for the wounded.”
”And poor me! When do I come in?” asked Kent.
”You come in early and behave yourself or I'll spend the rest of the time making suffrage speeches,” laughed the war bride.
And now since we must leave our friends some where, what better time and place than at this second wedding breakfast, while all of them are together and happy? Perhaps we shall meet them again when the old red house on the campus shall be taxed to its utmost in its endeavor to behave like Chatsworth. We shall see Judy and Kent in their little flat and mayhaps taste one of Judy's tarts. We must know more of Molly's girls at Wellington and meet dear Nance Oldham and little Otoyo Sen again. It is hard to part forever with our friends and those who know Molly Brown feel that all her friends are theirs.
So I hope our readers will be glad to meet again ”Molly Brown's College Friends.”
THE END.
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