“Take it away and let me drink my coffee,” I said, and I could see Annette’s French eyes snap as she laid down the offering from Matthew and went to attend upon Bess.

“Dear Matt,” I murmured when I had consumed the coffee and discovered the long string of gorgeous pearls in the white box.  “Come on, Bess, let’s begin to get married and be done with it,” I called to her as I wearily arose.  “What time did Polly say she and Matthew had decided to marry me?” I asked as I went into my bath.

“Five o’clock, and it’s almost twelve now,” answered Bess in a voice of panic as I heard things begin to fly into place in her room.

Despite the superhuman efforts and patience of Annette and two housemaids, directed from below by Owen and Judge Rutherford, it was half-past two o’clock before I was ready to descend to the car in which Matthew had been sitting, patiently waiting in the sunshine of his wedding day for almost two hours.

“Plenty of time,” he said cheerily, as I sank into the seat beside him, and Bess and Owen climbed in behind us.  Owen’s chauffeur took Judge Rutherford in Owen’s car, and Annette perched her prim self on the front seat beside the wheel.

“Oh, Matt, there is nobody in the world like you,” I said as I cast myself on his patience and imperturbability and also the strength of his broad shoulder next mine.  I could positively hear Bess and Owen’s joy over this bride-like manifestation, which the wind took back to them as we went sailing out of town towards the Riverfield ribbon.

And to their further joy I put my cheek down against Matthew’s throttle arm and closed my eyes so that I did not see anything of the twenty-mile progression out to Elmnest.  I only opened them when we arrived in Riverfield at about half after three o’clock.

Was the village out to greet me?  It was not.  Every front door was closed, and every front shutter shut, and I might have felt that some dire disapproval was being expressed of me and my wedding if I had not seen smoke fairly belching from every kitchen chimney, and if I hadn’t known that each house was filled with the splash of vigorous tubbing for which the kitchen stoves and wash boilers were supplying the hot water.

“Bet at least ten pounds of soap has gone up in lather,” said Matthew as he turned and explained the situation to Bess and Owen after I had explained it to him.

At the door of Elmnest stood Polly in a gingham dress, but with both ends of her person in bridal array, from the white satin bows on the looped up plats to the white silk stockings and satin slippers, greeting us with relief and enthusiasm.  Beside her stood Aunt Mary and the parent twins, also Bud, in the gray suit with a rose in his button-hole.

Matthew handed me out and into their respective embraces, while he also gave Polly a bundle of dry-goods from which I could see white satin ribbon bursting.

“Everything is ready,” she confided to him.