The Beloved Stranger (7 page)

Swiftly they stole up the iron stairs, Sherrill ahead, reaching down a guiding hand in the dark, giggling a little, nervously, as they stepped inside the window. Then she scuttled him down the back hall, opened a door to a small room that had been fixed up for the occasion as a dressing room, showed him how to find the front stairs, and directed him where to meet her as soon as he was ready.

Back through the two dim rooms where she had so recently come face-to-face with catastrophe, she hurried; only they were not in confusion now. The maids had been there straightening up. There were no traces of Cassie’s suitcase nor Linda’s street shoes. All was in immaculate order, the door thrown open to accommodate the expected crowds.

Sherrill slipped into her own room and fastened both doors.

Here, too, were signs of straightening. Her suitcase was closed, the closet doors and bureau drawers shut, everything put carefully away. But this room, of course, was not to be used for the guests. It was where the bride was expected to dress for going away.

Sherrill dashed to the dressing table and tried to obliterate as far as possible the traces of the past hour’s experience from her face. She didn’t care personally how she looked, but she did not want the assembled multitude to remark on her ghastly appearance. If she must go through this evening, she would do it gallantly.

She waited long enough to possess herself of a great ostrich feather fan that just matched the green of her frock. It would be wonderful to hide behind if need came, and give her a brave appearance. Then she put on the gorgeous necklace of emeralds, with three long pendants of emeralds and diamonds, a family heirloom that Aunt Pat had given her just that day. She must have something to replace the bridal pearls that were hers no longer. There were some rings and bracelets, too. She hadn’t had much time to get acquainted with them. She fingered them over and chose one luscious square-cut emerald for her finger. Her hands also should go bravely, not missing the diamond which she had worn for the past four months.

She slipped the magnificent ring on her finger, closed her eyes for a second, taking a deep breath, then hurried downstairs.

There were sounds of approach at the front of the house, the lively chatter of bridesmaids disembarking from their respective cars. Aunt Pat was just entering the front door leaning on Gemmie’s arm. Off in the far corner of the great reception room to the right, she could see Carter with his bride huddled under the bower of palms and flowers like a pair of frightened fowls between the clearing of two storms. The bride had her back toward the hall and was talking earnestly. Carter was half turned away, too, casting furtive frantic glances behind him, an ungroomly scowl upon his handsome brow. Poor Arla! Her hell had probably begun!

Sherrill unfurled her green fan and went bravely forward to meet Aunt Pat.

Chapter 4

G
emmie gave Sherrill a frightened scrutinizing glance, took the old lady’s wrap and scarf, and fled, casting another worried, puzzled look behind her.

Sherrill took her aunt’s arm. The old lady was smiling affably, but there was an inscrutable look about her. Sherrill couldn’t tell whether it held disapproval or not. It was a mask—she could see that.

“What’s her name? Who is she?” demanded the old lady out of the side of her mouth, without moving her lips or disturbing her smile. She was steering Sherrill straight toward the bridal bower. Sherrill had to speak quickly, keeping her own lips in a smile that she was far from feeling.

“She’s his secretary, Arla Prentiss. He’s known her for years.”

“Hmm! The puppy!” grunted the old lady under her smile, and then raising her voice a little, “Come, let’s get this line in order! Where’s this bride and groom? Mrs. McArthur, Mr. McArthur—” Her voice was smooth, even, jovial and yet frigid, if such a combination can be imagined. Just as if she had not been calling the groom “Carter” for the past six weeks!

The bride and groom swung around to face her, the bride with a heightened color and a quick lifting of her chin as of one who expects a rebuff, the groom with every bit of color drained from his handsome face, and points of steel in his sulky eyes.

“I’m sure I hope you’ll both be very happy,” said Aunt Pat with a grimly humorous twist of her smile, implying perhaps that they didn’t deserve to be, and then with just a tinge of the Catherwood haughtiness, she took her place in the line as had been arranged.

Now had come the most trying moment for Sherrill, the one spot in the program that she hadn’t been able to think out ahead. It was as if she had blindly shut her eyes to the necessity of speaking to these two, unable to prepare the right words of formal greeting, unable to school her expression. And here she was facing them with that silly smile upon her lips and nothing in her heart to say but horror at the situation, which such a brief time ago had been so different!

And then, just as a strange constriction came into her throat to stop any words she might try to form with her cold dumb lips, and her smile seemed to her to be fading out across the room and getting hopelessly away from her forever, she felt a touch upon her arm, and there miraculously was Copeland, meticulously arrayed in evening garb, a cheery grin upon his face and merry words upon his lips: “Is this where you want me to be, Sherrill?”

The ice melted from Sherrill’s heart, her frightened throat relaxed, fear fled away, and the smile danced back into her eyes. He had come in just the nick of time. A warm feeling of gratitude flowed around her heart, and her voice returned with a delightful little lilt.

“Oh, is that you, Gray? How did you manage to get back so soon? Yes, this is just where I want you. Let me introduce you to the bride. Mrs. McArthur, my friend Mr. Copeland of Chicago. Mr. McArthur, Graham.”

Arla eyed the two keenly.

“Were you old schoolmates?” she asked the stranger brightly. “Carter and I went to school together from kindergarten up through senior high.”

“Well, not exactly schoolmates,” answered Copeland with an amused glance at Sherrill, “but we’re pretty good friends, aren’t we, Sherrill?” He cast a look of deep admiration and understanding toward the girl in green, and she answered with a glowing look.

“I should say!” She rippled a little laugh. “But come, Graham, they’re all arriving in a bunch, and you’ve got to meet the bridesmaids and ushers. Here, come over to Aunt Pat first!” and they swung away from the astounded bridal couple with formal smiles.

“Aunt Pat, I want you to know Mr. Graham Copeland of Chicago. He’s been a really wonderful friend to me. She’s Miss Catherwood, Gray. I’ve told you about her.”

“And why haven’t I been told about
him
before?” asked Aunt Pat as she took the young man’s hand and gave him a keen, quick, friendly look. Then, as her old eyes twinkled, “Oh, I have met him before, haven’t I? You had a blue coat on when I saw you last!” and her lips twisted into what would have been called a grin if she had been a few years younger.

“You’re one of the conspirators in this practical joke we’re playing, I suppose?” and her eyes searched his again.

“I trust I’m a harmless one, at least,” he said gracefully.

And then there came a sudden influx of bridesmaids preening their feathers and chattering like a lot of magpies.

They gushed into the room and seemed to fill it with their light and color and jubilant noise.

“Sherrill Cameron! Whatever did you put over on us?”

“Oh, Sherrill, you fraud! All these weeks and we thinking
you
were the bride!”

“What was the idea, Sherrill? Did you expect us to fall over in a faint when we saw another bride?”

“But we all thought it was you for the longest time!”

“I didn’t!” said Linda. “I knew when she got out of her car that there was something different about her!”

“Shh!”

Into the midst of the bevy of voices came Sherrill’s clear, controlled one, sweet, almost merry, though Aunt Pat turned a keen ear and a keen eye on her and knew she was under great strain: “Girls! Girls! For pity’s sake! Hush with your questions! Come and meet the bride, and then get into the receiving line quick! Don’t you see the guests are beginning to arrive?”

The girls turned dizzily about as Sherrill, with a smile almost like her own natural one, approached the bride: “Arla—” The name slipped off her tongue glibly, for somehow with Aunt Pat and Graham Copeland in the background she felt more at her ease. “Arla—” The bride turned in quick astonishment to hear herself addressed so familiarly. “Let me introduce your bridesmaids. This is Linda Winters, and Doris Graeme—”

She went on down the row, speaking their names with more and more confidence, and suddenly the best man, who had been on some errand of his office, loomed frowning beside her.

“And oh, here’s the best man! Carter, you’ll have to make the rest of the introductions. I simply must get these girls into place! Here come all the ushers, too! I’ll leave you to introduce them to your wife!” She said it crisply and moved away to make room for them, pushing the laughing bridesmaids before her and arranging them, with room for the ushers between, though everyone knew as well as she did where they ought to stand, having rehearsed it only the night before.

Then Sherrill slid behind them back to her place by Aunt Pat and the stranger, a place that had
not
been rehearsed the night before.

It was a hard place, a trying place, the worst place she could have been. She knew that when she chose it. But she had to face the music, and knew it was better to do it merrily at the head of the line than skulking at the foot where there would be plenty of time for explanation and questions.

So as the crowd of guests surged into the big lovely room, filled with curiosity and excitement, and ready to pull any secret one might have from the air and waft it to the world, it was Sherrill who stood at the head of the line in her lettuce-green taffeta, the little frock she had bought as a whimsy at the last minute, her second-best silver shoes, and the gorgeous Catherwood emeralds blazing on her neck and arms and finger. She was wafting her great feather fan graciously, and by her side was a handsome stranger! Would wonders never cease? The guests stepped in, gave one eager avid glance, and hastened to the fray.

Aunt Pat was next to the stranger, smiling her cat-in-the-cream smile, with twinkles in her eyes and a grim look of satisfaction.

“You ought to be at the head of the line, Aunt Pat,” demurred Sherrill. “I really don’t belong in this line at all.”

“Stay where you are!” commanded the old lady. “This is
your
wedding, not mine. Run it the way you please. I’m only here to lend atmosphere.” She said it from one corner of her mouth, and she twinkled at the stranger. She was standing next to the bride and groom, but she hadn’t addressed two words to them since her congratulations. However, they were getting on fairly well with the best man and maid of honor on the other side, and the stage was set for the great oncoming crowd.

Mrs. Battersea with her ultramodern daughter-in-law in the wake headed the procession, with the Reamers, the Hayworths, and the Buells just behind. They represented the least intimate of the guests, the ones who would really be hard to satisfy. Sherrill, with a furtive glance up at the tall stranger by her side, aware of his kindly, reassuring grin, felt a sudden influx of power in herself to go through this ordeal. It helped, too, to realize that several others were having an ordeal also. It probably wasn’t just what this stranger would have chosen to do, to play his part in this strange pageant, and she was sure Aunt Pat hated it all, though she was entering into the scene with a zest as if she enjoyed it. Aunt Pat hated publicity like a serpent.

And there were the bride and groom. One could scarcely expect them to enjoy this performance. Sherrill cast them a furtive glance. The bride was a game little thing. She was holding her head high and conversing bravely with all those chattering bridesmaids, who kept surging out of line to get a word with her. And Carter, well, Carter had always been able to adjust himself to his surroundings pretty well, but there was a strained white look about him. Oh, whatever he might have felt for either of his prospective brides, it was scarcely likely that he was enjoying this reception. It was most probable that he would give all he possessed to have a nice hole open in the floor and let him and his Arla through out of sight.

So Sherrill drew a deep breath, summoned a smile, and greeted Mrs. Battersea, sweeping up in purple chiffon with orchids on her ample breast.

“Now, Sherrill, my dear,” said the playful lady, “what does this all mean? You’ve got to give us a full explanation of everything.”

“Why, it was just that we thought this would be a pleasant way to do things,” smiled Sherrill. “Don’t you think it was a real surprise? Mrs. Battersea, do let me introduce my friend Mr. Copeland of Chicago. Oh, Mrs. Reamer, I’m so glad you got well in time to come!”

Suddenly Sherrill felt a thrill of triumph. She was getting away with it! Actually she was! Mrs. Battersea had been not only held at bay but also entirely sidetracked by this new young man introduced into the picture. She closed her mouth on the question that had been just ready to pop out and fixed her eyes on Copeland, a new fatuous smile quickly adjusted, as she passed with avidity to the inquisition of this stranger. Here was she, the first in the line, and it was obviously up to her to get accurate information concerning him and convey it as rapidly as possible to the gathering assembly. Sherrill could see out of the corner of her eye this typical Battersea attitude, even as the guest put up her lorgnette to inspect the young man. She felt a pang of pity for her new friend. Did he realize what he was letting himself in for when he promised to stand by her through this? Oh, but what a help he was! How his very presence had changed the attitude that might have been, the attitude of pity for a cast-off bride! And, too, he had brought in an element of mystery, of speculation. She could see how avidly Mrs. Battersea was drinking in the possibilities as she approached.