she had made for the occasion.  She had routed out an old lavender satin, which she had worn years ago and had laid aside for mourning when her father died.  It was made in one of those quaint styles which defy fashion.  Lucinda had not changed as to her figure.  She hesitated a little at the V-shape of the neck.  She wondered if she really ought not to fill that in with lace, but she shook her head defiantly, and fastened around her neck a black velvet ribbon with a little pearl pin.  Then she tucked Albion’s violets in the lavender satin folds of her waist.  Her hair was still untouched with gray, and she had spoken the truth when she had said she could arrange it like a girl.  She had puffed it low over her temples and given it a daring twist in the back.

Albion fairly gasped when he saw her.  “Lord!” said he, “why ain’t you been for candy and soda to the store, too?”

Few people at the wedding noticed Lucinda and Albion, but they noticed each other to that extent that all save themselves seemed rather isolated from them.  Albion whispered to Lucinda that she would make a beautiful bride, and she looked up at him, and they were in love.

They stood well back.  Neither Lucinda nor Albion were pushing.  Lucinda considered that her wonderful city boarders belonged in the front ranks, and Albion shared her opinion.  It was a beautiful wedding.  The old house was transformed into a bower with flowers and vines.  Musicians played in the south room, which was like a grove with palms.  There was a room filled with the wedding-presents, and the glitter of cut glass and silver seemed almost like another musical effect.

The wedding was to be at eight o’clock.  Everybody was there before that time.  Meeks and Henry stood together in the hall by the spiral staircase, which was wound with flowers and vines.  Henry wore a dress-suit for the first time in his life.  Meeks wore an ancient one, in which he moved gingerly.  “I believe I weigh fifty pounds more than I did when the blamed thing was made,” he said to Henry, “and the broadcloth is as thin as paper.  I’m afraid to move.”

Henry looked very sober.  “What’s the matter, Henry?” asked Sidney.

“It’s Sylvia.”

“Sylvia?  I thought—­”

“Yes, I thought, too, that she had got what was on her mind off it, but she hasn’t.  I don’t know what ails her.  She ain’t herself.  I’m worried to death about her.”

Then the wedding-march was played and the bridal party came down the stairs.  Rose was on the arm of the lawyer who had acted as her trustee.  He was to give her away.  The task had been an impossible one for Henry to undertake, although he had been the first one thought of by Rose.  Henry had told Meeks, and the two had chuckled together over it.  “The idea of a man from a shoe-shop giving away a bride in real lace at a swell wedding,” said Henry.

“She was the right sort to ask you, though,” said Meeks.