de, but he was
exceedingly irascible and hard to manage. He was annoyed with Braden. When
the strange illness came early in the night, he sent out for his grandson.
He wanted him to be there if anything serious was to result from the
stroke,--he persisted in calling it a stroke, scornfully describing his
attack as a "rush of blood to the head from a heart that had been squeezed
too severely by old Father Time." Braden was not to be found. What annoyed
Mr. Thorpe most was the young man's unaccountable disposition to desert
him in his hour of need. In his querulous tirade, he described his
grandson over and over again as an ingrate, a traitor, a good-for-nothing
without the slightest notion of what an obligation means.

He did not know, and was not to know for many days, that his grandson had
purposely left town with the determination not to return until the ill-
mated couple were well on their way to the Southland, where the ludicrous
honeymoon was to be spent. And so it was that the old family doctor had to
be called in to take charge of Mr. Thorpe in place of the youngster on
whom he had spent so much money and of whom he expected such great and
glorious things.

He would not listen to a word concerning a postponement. Miss Tresslyn was
called up on the telephone by Wade at eight o'clock in the morning, and
notified of the distressing situation. What was to be done? At first no
one seemed to know what _could_ be done, and there was a tremendous flurry
that for the time being threatened to deprive Mr. Thorpe of a mother-in-
law before the time set for her to actually become one. Doctors were
summoned to revive the prostrated Mrs. Tresslyn. She went all to pieces,
according to reports from the servants' hall. In an hour's time, however,
she was herself once more, and then it was discovered that a postponement
was the last thing in the world to be considered in a crisis of such
magnitude. Hasty notes were despatched hither and thither; caterers and
guests alike were shunted off with scant ceremony; chauffeurs were
commandeered and motors confiscated; everybody was rushing about in
systematic confusion, and no one paused to question the commands of the
distracted lady who rose sublimely to the situation. So promptly and
effectually was order substituted for chaos that when the clock in Mr.
Thorpe's drawing-room struck the hour of four, exactly ten people were
there and two of them were facing a minister of the gospel,--one