The President Part 45

The wedding offered a rich study in expression. Richard was pale but firm, and if his knees shook the aspen disgrace of it didn't show in his face. Dorothy was radiantly happy--beautiful and unabashed. Somehow, a wedding never fails to bring out the strength of your true woman. Bess was splendidly responsible; she showed plainly that she considered the wedding the work of her hands, and was bound to see justice done it. Her supporting damsels, taking their cue from certain bridesmaids who had adorned a recent wedding of mark, wept bitterly. Mr. Bayard was interested in a courteous way; Mr. Harley was patronizing, Senator Hanway benign. Inspector Val, ineffable as to garb, was distinguished by that sleepy, well-bred stare which was his common expression when off duty. Only once did he rouse, and that was when Mrs. Hanway-Harley, deluded by his elegant reserve, over which was thrown just an aroma of the military, addressed him as Captain Burleigh of the English legation.

Mr. Sands of all who were there was probably the one most coolly composed; being in profound contrast to Mr. Fopling, whose eye was gla.s.sy and whose cheek was ashes.

"Stawms," whispered Mr. Fopling, tremulous with agitation, "if I'm as weak as this at your wedding, what do you weckon I'll be at my own? 'Pon my word, I think I'll have to be bwought to church in an invalid's chair; I do, weally!"

"Bless you, my boy, bless you!" exclaimed Mr. Harley, grasping Richard's hand. Mr. Harley had absorbed the impression, probably from the theaters, that this was the phrase for him. "And you, my child; G.o.d bless you! Be happy!" continued Mr. Harley, kissing Dorothy and exuding a burgundian tear.

"I am sorry," said Richard, as Senator Hanway bid him and Dorothy an affectionate farewell, "I am sorry the event of the convention disappointed us."

"It is as one who wishes his party and his country well would have it,"

returned Senator Hanway, with Roman elevation. "Governor Obstinate is a patriot, and an able man. He will call to his Cabinet safe men--true advisers. The nation could not be in purer hands."

Bess made Dorothy promise to have Richard back for her own wedding in October; Mr. Fopling gave Richard a pleading glance as though he himself would require support on that occasion.

"Stawms, don't fail me," said Mr. Fopling. "Weally, I shall need all the couwage my fwiends can give me. And you know, Stawms, I stood by you."

Mrs. Hanway-Harley supposed the happy ones were to take the B. & O. for New York; Richard explained that they would have a boat.

"In fact," said Richard, "the captain has just sent me word that the yacht is anch.o.r.ed off the Navy Yard, awaiting our going aboard."

"Yacht?" said Mrs. Hanway-Harley. "Oh, I see; Mr. Gwynn's."

"No, not Mr. Gwynn's. Ours."--And Richard looked more lamblike than ever.

Mrs. Hanway-Harley became sorely puzzled. The truth was slowly soaking into her not over-porous comprehension.

As the launch, with the wedding party, rounded the yacht's stern to reach her gangway on the off-sh.o.r.e side, Mrs. Hanway-Harley read in letters of raised gilt: _Dorothy Storms_. She called Dorothy's attention to the phenomenon in a misty way. Mrs. Hanway-Harley, once aboard, went over the _Dorothy Storms_, forward and aft, speaking no word. The yacht, Clyde-built, was a swift ocean-going vessel of twelve hundred tons. Her fittings were the fittings of a palace. Mrs. Hanway-Harley cornered Richard on the after-deck.

"Richard," said Mrs. Hanway-Harley, "what took Mr. Gwynn abroad?"

"Why," responded Richard, with a cheerful manner of innocence, "you see there's a deal for Mr. Gwynn to do. There's the country house in Berks, and the house in London; then there's the Paris house and the villa at Nice, and lastly the place in the mountains back of Naples;--Mr. Gwynn will have to put them in order. The one near Naples--a kind of old castle, it is--has been in bad hands; there will be plenty of work in that quarter for Mr. Gwynn, I fancy. You know, mother,"--and Richard donned an air of filial confidence,--"since this is Dorothy's first look at them, I'm more than commonly anxious she should be given a happy----"

Where the wretched Richard would have maundered to will never be known, for he was broken in upon by Mrs. Hanway-Harley.

"Richard, who is Mr. Gwynn?" This with a severe if agitated gravity.

"Who is Mr. Gwynn?"

"Who is Mr. Gwynn?" repeated Richard, blandly. "Well, really, I suppose he might be called my major-domo; or perhaps butler would describe him."

"You told me that Mr. Gwynn had had about him the best society of England."

Mrs. Hanway-Harley's manner bordered upon the tragic, for it bore upon her that she had given a dinner of honor to Mr. Gwynn.

"Why, my dear mother, and so he has had. I can't remember all their n.o.ble names, but one time and another Mr. Gwynn has been butler for the Duke of This and the Earl of That--really Mr. Gwynn's recommendations read like a leaf from 'Burke's Peerage.' I myself had him from the Baron Sudley."

Mrs. Hanway-Harley was for the moment dumb. Dorothy and Bess appeared, having completed a ransack of staterooms and cabins. The sight of her daughter restored to Mrs. Hanway-Harley the power of speech.

"Dorothy," she cried, raising her hands limply, "Dorothy, I believe our Richard's rich!" And Mrs. Hanway-Harley wept.

"I shall always love him, whatever he is!" exclaimed Dorothy, all tenderness and fresh alarm.

Dorothy did not understand.

It was ten o'clock; the Potomac lay between its soft banks like a river of silver. There was the throb of the engines, and the talk of the water against her bows, as the _Dorothy Storms_ with her two pa.s.sengers, they and their love, swept onward through the moonlight. Dorothy, her head on Richard's shoulder, and thinking on her mother and Bess and all she had left behind, watched the V-shaped wake as it spread away in ripples to either bank. Now and then a sh.o.r.e-light slipped by, to snuff out astern as distance or a bend in the river extinguished it. Dorothy crept more and more into the Pict arms.

"Dear, when did you name the _Dorothy Storms_?"

"The day after you precipitated yourself into my arms--and my heart."

"I think you were shamefully confident," whispered Dorothy, with a delicious sigh.

Richard the brazen replied to the attack as became a lover and gentleman.

And so they sailed away.

THE END