Part 71 (1/2)

'Yes, Tom; I'm going to marry Harold,' Jerrie replied, unhesitatingly, as she laid her hand on Tom's arm and walked with him down the stairs.

It seemed to her the most natural thing in the world that she should marry Harold, and she was not at all abashed in speaking of it to Tom; but when outside they saw Harold coming up the walk, the color rushed to her cheeks, and her eyes grew wondrously bright with the love-light which shown in them, as she dropped Tom's arm and hurried to Harold's side.

'By George, I b'lieve I'll go and hang myself!' Tom said, under his breath, as he stalked moodily away; but instead of that he went across the fields to Le Bateau, where he sat for an hour, talking with old Peterkin and waiting for Ann Eliza, who had gone to Springfield, her father said, after a new gown, for which he was to pay two hundred dollars.

'Think on't!' he continued. 'When we was fust married and run the 'Liza Ann, the best gown May Jane had to her back was a mereener or balzarine--dummed if I know what you call it--at one and ninepence a yard; but now, lord land, what's two hundred dollar gownd to me! Ann Eliza can have forty on 'em, if she wants to. There she is; there's the kerridge! By gosh, though, ain't she a neat little filly!' and the father's face glowed with pride as he watched his daughter alighting from the carriage, to which Tom had hastened in order to a.s.sist her, for she was still a little lame and limped as she walked.

He saw the two hundred dollar gown, for Peterkin would have it displayed, and admired it, of course, and wished thut he had half the sum it cost in his own right, and wondered if he could stand it, as he walked slowly home, where he heard from his mother that they were still to remain at Tracy Park for a while, and that his father was to have one hundred thousand dollars settled upon him.

'I guess now I'll wait a spell, and let old Peterkin go to thunder,' he decided, and for two weeks and more Ann Eliza watched in vain for his coming, while Peterkin remarked to his wife that if Tom Tracy was goin'

to play fast and loose with his gal, he'd find himself brought up standin' mighty lively.

The news that Harold and Jerrie were soon to be married, and go with Arthur to Germany, created some surprise, and some talk, too, in town, where many of the people had believed that there had been an understanding, if not an engagement, between Harold and Maude. But Tom put that right with a few decided words. There had never been an engagement, he said. Maude had liked Harold very much, and he had liked her, but had always preferred Jerrie; in short, matters had been as good as settled between them, long ago.

This last was a little fiction of Tom's brain, but the people accepted it as true, and began to look eagerly forward to the approaching marriage, wondering, as people will, who would be invited, and who would not. It took place the 10th of October, in Mrs. Crawford's little parlor, with only a few intimate friends present--Grace Atherton, the St. Claires, Ann Eliza Peterkin, and the Tracys, with the exception of Dolly, who could not do so great violence to her feeling, as to attend a wedding. Billy was not there, but he sent a magnificent emerald ring to Jerrie, with the following note:

DEAR JERRIE,--I can't see you married, although I am glad for you, and glad for Hal. G.o.d bless you both. I shall never forget you as long as I live; and when you come back, maybe I can bear to see you as Hal's wife, but now it would kill me. Good-bye.

Jerrie read this note with wet eyes up in her room, and then pa.s.sed it to Harold, to whom she told of that episode under the b.u.t.ternut tree, when Billy asked her to be his wife.

'Poor Billy! I am awful sorry for him, but I can't let him have you, Jerrie,' Harold said, pa.s.sing the note back to her, and kissing her tenderly, as he added: 'That is my last kiss for Jerrie Tracy, my little girl of the carpet-bag. When I kiss you again, you will be my wife.'

'Come, children, we are waiting,' came with startling distinctness from Arthur at the foot of the stairs, and then Harold and Jerrie went down to the parlor, where they were soon made one, Arthur giving the bride away, and behaving pretty well under the circ.u.mstances.

He had been very flighty the day before, insisting that Jerrie should be married in white, with a blue ribbon on her bonnet, just as Gretchen had been, and when she reminded him of Maude's recent death, he replied:

'Well, Gretchen will wear colors if you do not.'

And again he brought out and laid upon his bed the dress bought in Paris years before, and which had been waiting for Gretchen on that stormy night when he heard the wild cry of the dying woman above the wintery gale. She was with him again in fancy, and when he went out to the carriage which was to carry him to the cottage, he stepped back and stood a moment by the door as if to let some one enter before him, and all during the ceremony those nearest to him heard him whispering to himself, 'I, Arthur, take thee, Gretchen,' and so forth; but when it was over he came to himself and seemed perfectly rational, as he kissed his daughter and shook hands with his son-in-law, to whom he gave a check for ten thousand dollars, saying as he did so, that young men must have a little spending money.

It was a very pleasant wedding, and every one seemed happy, even to d.i.c.k, whose spirits, however, were rather too gay to be quite natural, and whose voice shook just a little as he called Jerrie Mrs. Hasting, and told her he hoped to see her in Paris in the spring as he thought of going over there with Nina to join the Raymonds.

'Oh, I hope you will! Nothing could make me so happy as to meet you there,' Jerrie said, looking at him with an expression which told him she was thinking of the pines and was sorry for him.

The newly married pair were going directly to New York, where Arthur was to join them on the 4th, as the _Germanic_ sailed the 15th.

All the wedding guests accompanied them to the station, Tom accepting a seat in the coupe with Ann Eliza, who wore her two hundred dollar gown, and was, of course, overdressed. But Tom did not think much about that.

He was ill at ease that morning, though trying to seem natural; and when the train which took Jerrie away disappeared from view, he felt as if everything which had made life desirable had left him forever, and he cared but little now what he did, or with whom his lot was cast.

So when Ann Eliza, who had cried at parting with Jerrie, dried her eyes and said to him, 'It is such a fine day; suppose we drive along the river; it may dispel the blues,' he a.s.sented, and soon found himself bowling along the smooth turnpike with Ann Eliza, whom he thought rather interesting, with the tears shed for Jerrie on her long, light eyelashes.

'I shall miss her so much, and be so lonely without her. I hope you'll call often,' she said to him, when at last the drive was over, and Tom promised that he would, and kept his promise, too; for after Arthur left, he found Tracy Park so insupportably dull, with his father always in Maude's room and his mother always in tears, that it was a relief to go to Le Bateau and be made much of as if he were a prince and treated to nice little lunches and suppers, even if old Peterkin did make one of the party and disgust him so at times that he felt as if he must s.n.a.t.c.h up his hat and fly.

And one night, when the old man had been more than usually disagreeable and pompous, he did start up abruptly and leave the house, mentally vowing never to enter it again.

'I'd rather saw wood and gather swill, as Hal used to, than listen to that infernal old brag,' he was saying to himself, when he heard a wheezy sound behind him, and looking round saw the old brag in full pursuit and beckoning him to stop.

'I'm goin' to walk a spell with you,' he said, locking his arm in Tom's as he came up. 'I want to have a little talk.'

'Yes,' Tom faltered, with a dreadful sinking of the heart, while Peterkin went on: