ells! Would to Heaven this huge load of
anxiety and care for her, which bowed me down, might be taken away
altogether!

"A fortnight longer," I said to myself, "and Tardif will know where she
is; then I can take measures for her tranquillity and safety in the
future."

It was well for me that I had slept during my passage, for I had little
sleep during that night. Twice I was aroused by the voice of Captain
Carey at my door, inquiring what the London time was, and if I could
rely upon my watch not having stopped. At four o'clock he insisted upon
everybody in the house getting up. The ceremony was to be solemnized at
seven, for the mail-steamer from Jersey to England was due in Guernsey
at nine, and there were no other means of quitting the island later in
the day. Under these circumstances there could be no formal
wedding-breakfast, a matter not much to be regretted. There would not be
too much time, so Johanna said, for the bride to change her
wedding-dress at her own house for a suitable travelling-costume, and
the rest of the day would be our own.

Captain Carey and I were standing at the altar of the old church some
minutes before the bridal procession appeared. He looked pale, but wound
up to a high pitch of resolute courage. The church was nearly full of
eager spectators, all of whom I had known from my childhood--faces that
would have crowded about me, had I been standing in the bridegroom's
place. Far back, half sheltered by a pillar, I saw the white head and
handsome face of my father, with Kate Daltrey by his side; but though
the church was so full, nobody had entered the same pew. His name had
not been once mentioned in my hearing. As far as his old circle in
Guernsey was concerned, Dr. Dobree was dead.

At length Julia appeared, pale like the bridegroom, but dignified and
prepossessing. She did not glance at me; she evidently gave no thought
to me. That was well, and as it should be. If any fancy had been
lingering in my head that she still regretted somewhat the exchange she
had made, that fancy vanished forever. Julia's expression, when Captain
Carey drew her hand through his arm, and led her down the aisle to the
vestry, was one of unmixed contentment.

Yet there was a pang in it--reason as I would, there was a pang in it
for me. I should have liked her to glance once at me, with a troubled
and dimmed eye. I should have liked a shade upon her face as I wrote my
name below hers in the register. But t