a snicker, but a warning
touch of Epstein's hand aided him to control himself.

The "dejeuner" almost put him "on the blink," he declared afterwards.
He was conscious only of two things: first, that the bride, amid all
the sweet confusion and merriment incidental to the occasion, found
time to introduce him to several ladies as "the dearest and cleverest
boy I know, next to Tommy," and that when the toasts were proposed he
had to make a speech. Epstein assisted him to stand, for the lad was
overwhelmed with embarrassment that amounted to fear. He never knew
just what he said at first, but when he recovered sufficiently to
realise that the faces turned toward him were kindly, and the smiles
were encouraging, his self-possession returned. Observant always, and
quick to see the right thing to do, William hoped that "Mister Watson
and his wife would live happy ever after, and," he concluded, with a
smile that was full of confidence, "I nearly snickered once when the
marriage was on. That was when the minister says something about, 'Do
you, Thomas Watson, take this woman for your wife?' or words something
like that, and I says to myself, 'Does he! Gee! And him looney
about----'" The rest was lost in a breeze of laughter and joyous
acclamations.

Afterwards there was more hustle and bustle, and finally the bride and
groom started for the railway station, with all the accompaniments
considered so necessary to start newly wedded couples on such journeys.
Others may have noticed, William certainly did, that though she smiled,
there were tears in Mrs. Dearmore's eyes as she stood at the doorstep
and waved her hands in farewell. And, as he left for the office,
William was thinking of that. "It means a lot for her," he said to
himself--"a lot. She--why--Flo will be--" he paused--"of course, of
course, it's always the way. It'll never be the same again for Mrs.
Dearmore, or Flo, or Tommy. This is a rummy world."

Later in the day he dropped into Tommy Watson's store and found the
assistants engaged in the hottest kind of argument. They took no
notice of him at all; indeed, they did not know he was there. He
listened for a few minutes, wrathful and unhappy, because he felt that
this was the time above all others when Tommy's business should be
attended to with diligence and enthusiasm, and then, still unnoticed,
he stole out of the store and ran back to the office. Whimple was not
in, and William, hastily glancing o