The Strange Proposal (2 page)

The prayer was over, the solemn final sentences said that made Camilla Chrystie and Jeffrey Wainwright man and wife, the tender consummating kiss given. Mary Elizabeth handed Camilla her lovely white orchids and adjusted the veil and the quaint, old-fashioned train, and Jeffrey and Camilla started down the way of life together. Then Mary Elizabeth adjusted her own flowers and turned, smiling, to greet the best man who stood there breathless above her.

John laid her hand on his arm as if it were something breakable. The thrill of it gave his face a radiance even through the Florida bronze. He looked down at her eagerly, as though they were long-lost friends who had by some miracle come together again.

“I’ve been looking for you for a long time!” he said as they wheeled into step. Mary Elizabeth looked up and saw something arresting and almost disturbing in his glance.

“Yes?” she said brightly. “I have been running around a good deal today. I guess I was hard to find.”

“Oh, not just today!” said John, conscious that the next measure was the one they should start on to follow the bride and groom. “A long time! Years! In fact, I guess I always knew there would be you sometime! But will you mind if I’m abrupt? We’ve only got from here to the door to talk and then the mob will snatch us apart, and I’ve got to leave on the midnight train!”

“Oh!” breathed Mary Elizabeth, looking up wonderingly into his eyes, a sparkle in her own.

They were off in perfect time with the stately old march now, quite unconscious of the eager audience watching them with keen eyes, not realizing that they were the next most interesting pair in the whole show, after the bride and groom, who had now passed out of sight of all except a few who deliberately turned around and stared at John and Mary Elizabeth’s backs.

“Who is she?” whispered Sallie Lane to Mrs. Sampson.

“Some relative of the groom, I heard.”

“But I thought it was to be Helen Foster!”

“Oh, hadn’t you heard? There was an accident and Helen’s train was late. They had to get somebody at the last minute. Don’t you see her dress is different? It isn’t the same stuff, doesn’t stand out so stiff and crisp, and it’s terribly plain. Too bad! I heard the bridal party all had their dresses made off the same pattern.”

“I like it. It kind of fits her. Say, don’t they look wonderful together? I shouldn’t wonder if they’re engaged or something. Look at the way he looks at her! They certainly know each other well.”

“I love you,” John was saying in a low, thrilling voice, a voice that was almost like a prayer.

And Mary Elizabeth, quite conscious now of the many eyes upon her, kept that radiant smile upon her lips and the sparkle in her eyes as she looked up to catch the low words from his lips.

“But you couldn’t, of course, all at once like that!” she said, smiling as if it were a good joke. “Is this supposed to be the newest thing in proposals of marriage? I’ve never had one going down a wedding aisle, though I’ve been maid of honor several times before.”

She looked up at him archly with her sparkling smile to cover the trembling of her lips, the strange thrilling of her heart over this stranger’s words.

“Is there any reason why it shouldn’t be that?” he breathed as they neared the door and the wedding party began to mull about them in the vestibule. It seemed to him they had fairly galloped down that aisle.

“If my gloves had been off, I suppose you might have thought there was,” said Mary Elizabeth with a sudden memory in her eyes.

“Your gloves?” said John, looking down at the little scrap of a hand that lay there like a white leaf on his arm.

Then suddenly he laid his other hand upon hers with a quick investigating pressure, and looked at her aghast.

“Then—you mean—that I am too late?” he asked, caring not that they were now in the midst of the giggling bridesmaids whispering what mistakes they had made, and how this one and that one had looked.

“Oh, not necessarily!” said Mary Elizabeth, now with a wicked twinkle in her eyes. “It was only an experiment, wearing it tonight. It came in the mail a few days ago with a very persistent letter, and I thought I might try it out. But there’s nothing final about it!”

And Mary Elizabeth gave him a ravishing childlike smile that left him bewildered and utterly routed. He didn’t know whether she was trying to be flippant or merely making talk to cover any possible embarrassment, for they were right in the thick of the crowd now, with someone outside directing traffic loudly, and suddenly John realized that he was still best man and had duties about putting the bride and groom in the right car. He fled headlong into the street.

He was the fool, of course, he told himself. He had gone off on a whim, and no girl in her senses would take sudden words spoken like that seriously. Oh, he had probably messed the whole thing up now. She wouldn’t even recognize him when she got to the hotel, or would call a lot of her friends to protect her. What a fool! What a fool he had been! He hadn’t thought that he could ever be impulsive like that!

But when he had slammed the door on Jeff and his bride and turned about with his miserable eyes to see what he could see, and whether she was still in sight, someone caught him and whirled him into a car.

“Here, Saxon,” the unknown voice said, “get in quick! Jeff wants you there as soon as he is!” The car whirled away before he was fairly seated. In fact, he almost sat down on someone who was already there in the dark, sitting in the far corner.

He turned to apologize, and she laughed, a soft little silvery laugh.

“I bribed the valet to give us a whole car to ourselves,” she said gaily, “so that you could finish what you had to say.”

He caught his breath and his heart leaped up.

“Do you mean that you are going to forgive me for being so—so—so presumptuous?” he asked.

“Do you mean you didn’t mean what you said?” rippled out Mary Elizabeth’s laughing voice, the kind of a laugh that sometimes covers tears.

“Mean what I said?” said John, in the tone he often used to rebuke a boy whom he was coaching when he was scoutmaster in Florida. “I certainly did mean what I said!” he repeated doggedly. “And I’ll always mean it. But I know I ought not to have flung it out at you that way in public, only I didn’t see that I would ever get another chance if I didn’t do something about it right away.”

“Why, I didn’t mind that,” said Mary Elizabeth gravely. “It was quite original and interesting. It made the walk down the aisle unique. Something to remember!” There was a lilt in her voice that might be suppressed mirth. John eyed her suspiciously through the dark, but she sat there demurely in her corner, and he felt awed before her. Perhaps he had been mistaken and she was one of those modern girls after all.

But no! He remembered the haloed face, the lovely unpainted smile. He would never think that! She might not be for him, but she was what she seemed. She could not be otherwise.

“Yes,” he said, with a tinge of bitterness in his voice, “something for you to laugh about afterward! A country hick come to town to make a fool of himself, putting a girl in an embarrassing position in public!”

“No!” she said sharply. “Don’t say that! You didn’t! I wasn’t embarrassed! I liked it! I really did! I felt … honored!”

And suddenly one of the little white hands stole out of the darkness and crept into his hand with a gentle reassurance, and—it was ungloved!

He folded his hand about hers, marveling at its delicacy, its softness, the way it lay relaxed within his own strong hand. It was then he remembered the ring under the glove.

“But—you are already engaged!” he reminded himself aloud sternly. And then he felt for the ring again. This was the same left hand that had lain upon his arm as they went down the aisle together—galloped down!

Then he sat up sharply, felt the little hand all over, and reached over to the other hand that lay in her lap. It still wore a glove!

He sat back again and drew a breath of relief.

“Where is that ring?” he said.

“Here, in my handbag,” she said, sweetly offering him a tiny scrap made of white beads and gilt. “Did you want it?”

“Was it a joke you were playing?” he accused sternly.

“Oh, no,” she answered lightly. “I told you it wasn’t at all final. I’ve had that ring several days, and I just thought I’d try it out tonight and see if I cared to keep it.”

He hesitated a moment, still holding the little ungloved hand that lay so yielded in his own.

“Then … there is no reason why I may not tell you of my love!”

“Well, I would have to consider that,” said Mary Elizabeth gravely. “It was rather unexpected, you know. But here we are at the hotel. Don’t you think perhaps we’d better get out now?”

John helped her out, thrilling with the thought of touching even the hem of her garment, guarding her flowers, picking up her glove from the cushion, touching her belovedly, his heart pounding away with an embarrassment and trepidation that was quite new to him. John was usually at his ease anywhere, and he had been in the world enough not to feel strange. But he felt like a fool when he thought of what he had been saying, and recalled the keen, bright retaliations.

They hurried through the hall and up the elevator to the big room set aside for the wedding reception, and John blessed the fate that gave him even this silent bit of time more before they had to face the others. He looked down upon her, in her lovely halo hat, and she looked up and smiled, and there was no scorn in her smile as he had feared. Yet she had in no way put herself in his debt. She had held her own. His eyes drank in her delicate beauty hungrily against a time of famine he feared might be swiftly coming. He would never forget her nearness, the soft fragrance that came from her garments, the natural loveliness of her. He tried to summon her name from his memory, where it hovered on the edge of things and evaded him. Was it Helen? But that was not the type of name for such a girl as this.

Then the elevator door clanged back and they stepped into the big room smothered in ferns and palms and flowers, and there in a distant arbor that seemed almost like an orchid-hung hammock in one of his own Florida forests, the bride and groom were taking their places, Camilla smiling up at Jeff so joyously that John’s heart gave another leap. Would such joy ever come to him?

He looked down at the girl by his side, and their eyes met and something flashed from one to the other, a gleam that thrilled them both.

C
ome,” said the girl, with a certain possessiveness in her voice, “we must go over and stand by them, you know.” She put her still ungloved hand on his and led him across the room. Behind them the elevator clanged again and opened its doors to let the green-clad bridesmaids surge in with the ushers, and the reception was upon them in full blast. But somehow John didn’t mind. His heart was leaping in new rhythm, and a song was in his heart.

“Hold this for me, please, while I put on my glove,” said Mary Elizabeth, handing over her little pearl purse as if she had been used to having him all her life for an escort.

He took the purse shyly in his bronzed hands. He was not accustomed to holding such trinkets for ladies. Not that he didn’t know plenty of ladies, but he had always shied out of paying them much attention. And yet, he liked the feel of her purse in his hand, and while he watched her putting on the glove so expertly, he grew bold enough to gently prod the purse till he had located the ring, a great ox of a stone, he told himself as he carefully appraised its value. He could never get her a ring like that, he thought to himself dismally in one of the intervals of the passing throng of guests. Even if he succeeded beyond his hopes he couldn’t. That ring had been bestowed by some millionaire of course, and she had been weighing its worth, and perhaps its owner. He frowned so hard that Uncle Warren Wainwright asked his wife afterward if that best man wasn’t a rather stern-looking fellow. But his wife said no, she thought he was splendid looking, so nice and tanned and well built, so he said he guessed he must have been mistaken. Uncle Warren was like that, always ready to concede to his wife’s opinion. He had made his money in spite of doing that.

The long procession of gushing or shy friends had surged by at last and the bridal party was seated around the bride’s table at the “throne end” as Jeffrey called it, of the banquet hall.

“There,” said Mary Elizabeth as John seated her, “isn’t this nice and cozy? You didn’t know we were going to sit together, did you?” John sat down beside her, feeling like a prisoner on parole.

There was comparative privacy where they were, amid the cheerful laughter and talk of the rest of the wedding party. The wedding roses, the tall candles, all made it a fairyland, and they carried on their little private conversation there between themselves, the girl continually ready with her sparkle and smiles. And nobody wondered that the attractive best man was absorbed in the lovely maid of honor.

Quite suddenly, it seemed, the wedding supper was over. John found his heart sinking. Soon the beautiful links would be broken, and when would he ever see her again? He tried to make some plans, say something to her about it, but the glamour of her presence somehow dazed him. He ought to tell her that he was a poor man. That it would be some time before he could claim her. He ought to let her know about his one year more of graduate work in medical school. She ought to know that his wedding could never be the grand affair that this was. He was not a Wainwright. There were things he ought to say to arrange what they should do in the future, but to save his life he could not say them, could not put them into the words that ought to frame them. Not with all these good, kindly people around them, shouting pleasant nothings across the table, mixing together for that one night, strangers, but with a common interest in the bride and groom. His tongue was tied! And perhaps there would be no other time!

“And I don’t even know your address,” he wailed, as suddenly the bride arose and everybody got up with her.

“I’ll write it for you and give it to you before you leave,” she assured him with a smile. “Where is my little bag? I have a pencil and card in it.”