"So long."

CHAPTER XI

A WEDDING-DAY IN BARNRIFF

If signs and omens meant anything at all, Eve Marsham and Will
Henderson were about to embark on a happy and prosperous married life.
So said the women of Barnriff on the day fixed for the wedding. The
feminine heart of Barnriff was a superstitious organ. It loved and
hugged to itself its belief in forebodings and portents. It never
failed to find the promise of disaster or good-fortune in the
trivialities of its daily life. It was so saturated with superstition
that, on the morning of the wedding, every woman in the place was on
the lookout for some recognized sign, and, finding none, probably
invented one.

And the excitement of it all. The single-minded, wholesome delight in
the thought of this wedding was as refreshing as the crisp breezes of
a first bright spring day. To a woman they reveled in the thought. It
was the first wedding actually to take place in the village for over
seven years. Everybody marrying during that period had elected to seek
the consummation of their happiness elsewhere. And as a consequence of
this enthusiasm, there was a surplus of help in getting the
meeting-room suitably clad for the occasion, and the preparations for
the "sociable" and dance which were to follow the ceremony.

Was there ever such a day in Barnriff? the women asked each other.
None of them remembered one. Then look at the day itself. True it was
the height of summer; but then who had not seen miserable weather in
summer? Look at the sun gleaming out of a perfect azure.

Mrs. Crombie, a florid dame of adequate size, if of doubtful dignity
to fill her position as spouse of Barnriff's first citizen, dragged
Mrs. Horsley, the lay preacher's wife, through the door of the Mission
Room, in which, with the others, they were both working at the
decorations, to view the sky.

"Look at it, my dear!" she cried enthusiastically. "Was there ever a
better omen for the poor dear? Not a cloud _anywhere_. Not one. And
it's deep blue, too; none of your steel blues, or one of them fady
blues running to white. Say, ain't she lucky? Now, when Crombie took
me the heavens was just pouring. Everybody said 'Tears' prompt enough,
and with reason. That's what _they_ said. But me and Crombie has never
shed a tear; no, not one. We've just laffed our way clear through to
this day, we have. Well, I won't say Crombie does a heap of laffing,
but you'll take my meaning."

And Carrie H