_ CHAPTER XLIV. THE END OF A BEGINNING
And now blow, all ye trumpets, and, all ye organs, tremble with exultant sound! Bring forth the harp, and the psaltry, and the sackbut! For the long winter of waiting is at an end, and Mike is flying north to fetch his bride. Now are the walls of heaven built four-square, and to-day was the roof-beam hung with garlands. 'Tis but a small heaven, yet is it big enough for two,--and Mike is flying north, flying north, through the midnight, to fetch his bride.
Henry and the morning meet him at Tyre. Blessings on his little wrinkled face! The wrinkles are deeper and sweeter by a year's hard work. He has laughed with them every night for full twelve months, laughed to make others laugh. To-day he shall laugh for himself alone. The very river seems glad, and tosses its shaggy waves like a faithful dog; and over yonder in Sidon, where the sun is building a shrine of gold and pearl, Esther, sleepless too, all night, waits at a window like the morning-star.
Oh, Mike! Mike! Mike! is it you at last?
Oh, Esther, Esther, is it you?
Their faces were so bright, as they gazed at each other, that it seemed they might change to stars and wing together away up into the morning. Henry snatched one look at the brightness and turned away.
"She looked like a spirit!" said Mike, as they met again further along the road.
"He looked like a little angel," said Esther, as she threw herself into Dot's sympathetic arms.
A few miles from Sidon there stood an old church, dim with memories, in a churchyard mossy with many graves. It was hither some few hours after that unwonted carriages were driving through the snow of that happy winter's day. In one of them Esther and Henry were sitting,--Esther apparelled in--but here the local papers shall speak for us: "The bride," it said, "was attired in a dress of grey velvet trimmed with beaver, and a large picturesque hat with feathers to match; she carried a bouquet of white chrysanthemums and hyacinths."
"The very earth has put on white to be your bridesmaid!" said Henry, looking out on the sunlit snow.
"After all, though, of course, I'm sad in one way," said Esther, more practical in her felicitations, "I'm glad in another that father wouldn't give me away. For it was really you who gave me to Mike long ago; wasn't it?--and so it's only as it should be that you should give me to him to-day."
"You'll never forget what we've been to each other?"
"Don't you know?"
"Yes, but our love has no organs and presents and prayer-books to bind it together."
"Do you think it needs it?"
"Of course not! But it would be fun for us too some day to have a marriage. Why should only one kind of love have its marriage ceremony? When Mike's and your wedding is over, let's tell him that we're going to send out cards for ours!"
"All right. What form shall the ceremony take--_Parfait Amour_?"
"You haven't forgotten?"
"I shall forget just the second after you--not before--and, no, I won't be mean, I'll not even forget you then."
"Kiss me, Esther," said Henry.
"Kiss me again, Esther," he said. "Do you remember?"
"The cake and the beating?"
"Yes, that was our marriage."
* * * * *
When all the glory of that happy day hung in crimson low down in the west, like a chariot of fire in which Mike and Esther were speeding to their paradise, Henry walked with Angel, homeward through the streets of Tyre, solemn with sunset. In both that happy day still lived like music richly dying.
"Well," said Angel, in words far too practical for such a sunset, "I am so glad it all went off so well. Poor dear Mrs. Mesurier, how bonny she looked! And your dear old Aunt Tipping! Fancy her hiding there in the church--"
"Of course we'd asked her," said Henry; "but, poor old thing, she didn't feel grand enough, as she would say, to come publicly."
"And your poor father! Fancy him coming home for the lunch like that!"
"After all, it was logical of him," said Henry. "I suppose he had made up his mind that he would resist as long as it was any use, and after that--gracefully give in. And he was always fond of Mike."
"But didn't Esther cry, when he kissed her, and said that, since she'd chosen Mike, he supposed he must choose him too. And Mike was as good as crying too?"
"I think every one was. Poor mother was just a mop."
"Well, they're nearly home by now, I suppose."
"Yes, another half-hour or so."
"Oh, Henry, fancy! How wonderful for them! God bless them. I _am_ glad!"
"I wonder when we shall get our home," said Henry, presently.
"Oh, Henry, never mind us! I can't think of any one but them to-day."
"Well, dear, I didn't mean to be selfish--I was only wondering how long you'd be willing to wait for me?"
"Suppose I were to say 'for ever!' Would that make you happy?"
"Well, I think, dear--I might perhaps arrange things by then."
[THE END]
Richard Le Gallienne's Novel: Young Lives
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