Miss
Hulett, in exactly the same tone of everyday remark. As she spoke she
slipped her arm under the other's head and poked the pillow to a more
comfortable shape. "Now you lay perfectly still," she commanded in the
hectoring tone of the born nurse; "I'm goin' to run down and make you up
a good hot cup of sassafras tea."

I followed her down into the kitchen and was met by the same refusal to
be melodramatic which I had encountered in Ev'leen Ann. I was most
anxious to know what version of my extraordinary morning I was to give
out to the world, but hung silent, positively abashed by the cool
casualness of the other woman as she mixed her brew. Finally, "Shall I
tell 'Niram--What shall I say to Ev'leen Ann? If anybody asks me----" I
brought out with clumsy hesitation.

At the realization that her reserve and family pride were wholly at the
mercy of any report I might choose to give, even my iron hostess
faltered. She stopped short in the middle of the floor, looked at me
silently, piteously, and found no word.

I hastened to assure her that I would attempt no hateful picturesqueness
of narration. "Suppose I just say that you were rather lonely here, now
that Ev'leen Ann has left you, and that you thought it would be nice to
have your sister come to stay with you, so that 'Niram and Ev'leen Ann
can be married?"

Emma Hulett breathed again. She walked toward the stairs with the
steaming cup in her hand. Over her shoulder she remarked, "Well, yes,
ma'am; that would be as good a way to put it as any, I guess."

'Niram and Ev'leen Ann were standing up to be married. They looked very
stiff and self-conscious, and Ev'leen Ann was very pale. 'Niram's big
hands, bent in the crook of a man who handles tools, hung down by his
new black trousers. Ev'leen Ann's strong fingers stood out stiffly from
one another. They looked hard at the minister and repeated after him in
low and meaningless tones the solemn and touching words of the marriage
service. Back of them stood the wedding company, in freshly washed and
ironed white dresses, new straw hats, and black suits smelling of
camphor. In the background among the other elders, stood Paul and Horace
and I--my husband and I hand in hand; Horace twiddling the black ribbon
which holds his watch, and looking bored. Through the open windows into
the stuffiness of the best room came an echo of the deep organ note of
midsummer.

"Whom God hath joined together----" said the minister, a