The Beloved Stranger

Chapter 2




For just an instant they faced one another, the bride in her beauty, and her woebegone rival, and in spite of herself Sherrill could not help thinking how pretty this other girl was. Even though she had been crying and there were tears on her lashes. She was not a girl whom crying made hideous. It rather gave her the sweet dewy look of a child in trouble.

She stood wide-eyed, horror and fear on her face, the soft gold of her hair just showing beneath a chic little hat. She was dressed in a stylish street suit of dark blue with slim correct shoes and long-wristed wrinkled white doeskin gloves. Even as she stood, her arms outspread and groping for refuge against the unfriendly wall, she presented an interesting picture. Sherrill could not help feeling sorry for her. There was nothing arrogant about her now. Just the look of a frightened child at bay among enemies.

“How long have you known him?” asked Sherrill, trying to keep her voice from trembling.

The other girl burst forth in an anguished tone, her hands going quickly to her throat, which moved convulsively: “Ever since we were kids!” she said with a choking sob at the end of her words. “Always we’ve been crazy about each other, even in high school. Then after he got started up in the city, he sent for me to be his secretary so we could be nearer to each other till we could afford to get married. It has never been any different till you came. It was you—you who took him away from me—!” and the girl buried her hands in the soggy little handkerchief and gave a great sob that seemed to come from the depths of her being.

Sherrill felt a sudden impulse to put her face down in her lovely roses and sob, too. It somehow seemed to be herself and not this other girl who was sobbing over there against the wall. Oh, how could this great disaster have befallen them both? Carter! Her matchless lover! This girl’s lover, too! How could this thing be?

“No,” she said, very white and still, her voice almost toneless and unsteady. “I never took him away from you. I never knew there was such a person as you!”

“Well, you took him!” sobbed the other girl, “and there’s nothing left for me but to kill myself!” and another great sob burst forth.

“Nonsense!” said Sherrill sharply. “Don’t talk that way! That’s terrible. You don’t get anywhere talking like that! Hush! Somebody will hear you! We’ve got to be sensible and think what to do!”

“Do?” said Arla, dropping her hands from her face and flashing a look of scorn at the girl in bridal array. “What is there to do? Oh, perhaps you mean how you can get rid of me the easiest way? I don’t see why I should make it easy for you I’m sure, but I suppose I will. I’ll go away and not make any more trouble of course. I suppose I knew that when I came, but I had to come! Oh!”—and she gave another deep sob and turned her head away for an instant, then back to finish her sentence—“and you will go out to the church to marry him. It is easy enough for you to say ‘hush’ when you are going to marry him!”

“Marry him!” said Sherrill, sudden horror in her voice. “I could never marry him after this! Could you?”

“Oh yes,” said the girl in a quivering, hopeless voice. “I’d marry him if I got the chance! You can’t love him the way I do or you would, too. I’d marry him if I had to go through hell to do it!”

Sherrill quivered at the words. She was watching this other girl, thinking fast, and sudden determination came into her face.

“Then you shall!” she said in a low clear voice of determination. “You may get taken at your word. You may have to go through hell for it. But I won’t be responsible for that. If you feel that way about it, you shall marry him!”

The other girl looked up with frightened eyes. “What do you mean?”

“I mean you shall marry him! Now! Tonight!” “But how could I?” she asked dully. “That would be impossible.”

“No, it is not impossible. Come! Quick. We have got to work fast! Listen! There comes somebody to the door. Come with me! Don’t make a sound!”

Sherrill snapped the light off and, grasping the gloved hand of the girl, she pulled her after her through the dimly lighted middle rooms and inside her own door, which she swiftly closed behind her, sliding the bolt.

“Now!” she said, drawing a breath of relief. “We’ve got to work like lightning! Take off your gloves and hat and dress just as fast as you can!”

Sherrill’s hands were busy with the fastening of her veil. Carefully she searched out the hairpins that held it and lifted it off, laying it in a great billow upon the bed, her hands at once searching for the fastening of her own bridal gown.

“But what are you going to do?” asked the other girl staring at her wildly, though she began automatically to pull off her long gloves.

“I’m going to put these things on you,” said Sherrill, pulling off her dress over her head frantically. “Hurry, won’t you? The car is probably out there waiting now. They’ll begin to get suspicious if we are a long time. Take off your hat quick! And your dress! Will it just pull over your head? Hurry, I tell you! What kind of stockings have you got on? Tan ones? That won’t do. Here, I’ve got another pair of silver ones in the drawer. I always have two pairs in case of a run. Sit down there, and peel yours off quick! I wonder if my shoes will fit you. You’ll have to try them anyway, for we couldn’t get any others!”

Sherrill kicked her silver shoes off and groped in the closet, bringing out an old pair of black satin ones and stepping into them hurriedly. The jeweled buckles glinted wickedly.

Her mind was working rapidly now. She dashed to her suitcase and rooted out a certain green taffeta evening gown, a recent purchase, one that she had especially liked and had planned to take with her, in case anything should delay her trunk. She dropped it over her own head, pulling it down with hurried hands and a bitter thought of what pleasure she had taken in it when she bought it. If she had known—ah, if she had known! But there was no time for sentiment.

The other girl was fitting on the silver stockings and shoes, her hands moving slowly, uncertainly.

“Here, let me fasten those garters!” said Sherrill almost compassionately. “You really must work faster than this! Stand up. Can you manage to walk in those shoes? They’re a bit long, aren’t they? My foot is long and slim. Stand up quick and take off that dark slip. Here, here’s the white slip,” and she slid it over the golden head of the other girl. Queer, their hair was the same color!

Sherrill’s mind was so keyed up that she thought of little painful things that at another time would not have attracted her attention.

“But I can’t do this!” said Arla Prentiss, suddenly backing away from the lovely folds of ivory satin that Sherrill was holding for her to slip into. “I couldn’t ever get away with it! Cart would kill me if I tried to do a thing like this!”

“Well, you were talking about killing yourself a few minutes ago,” said Sherrill sharply, wondering at herself as she said it. “It would be only a choice of deaths in that case, wouldn’t it? For mercy’s sake, stand still so I won’t muss your hair! This dress has got to go on you, and mighty quick, too!”

“But I couldn’t get away with a thing like this!” babbled Arla as she emerged from the sweeping folds of satin and found herself clothed in a wedding garment, drifting away in an awesome train such as her wildest dreams had never pictured.

“Oh yes, you could,” said Sherrill, snapping the fastenings firmly into place and smoothing down the skirt hurriedly. “All you’ve got to do is to walk up the aisle and say yes to things.”

“Oh, I couldn’t!” said Arla in sudden terror. “Why, they would know the minute I reached the church that it wasn’t you! They would never let it get even as far as walking up the aisle. They would mob me! They would drive me out—!” She paused with a great sob and sank down to the chair again.

“Get up!” said Sherrill, standing over her fiercely. “You’ll ruin that dress! Listen! There is someone coming to the door! Hush! Yes? Are you calling for me?” Sherrill spoke in a pleasant casual tone. “Is the car ready for me? You say it’s been ready ten minutes? Oh, well”—she laughed a high little unnatural trill—“that’s all right! They always expect a bride to be late. Well, tell the man I’ll be down in a minute or two now!”

The maid retreated down the stairs, and Sherrill flew over to the bed and took up the wedding veil carefully.

“Now, stand there in front of the mirror and watch,” she commanded as she held the lace cap high and brought it down accurately around the golden head. “Stand still, please. I’ve got to do this in just a second. And now listen to me.”

“But I can’t! I can’t really!” protested the substitute bride wildly. “I couldn’t let you do this for me!”

“You’ve got to!” said Sherrill commandingly. “I didn’t get up any of this mess, and it’s up to you to put this wedding through. Now listen! The man who is to take me —you in—is a stranger to me. His name is Nathan Vane. He’s a second cousin of my mother’s family and he’s never seen me. He hadn’t arrived yet when I came up to dress. Neither had the maid of honor, and she’s a stranger to me, too. Her name is Rena Scott. They’ll both be waiting at the door for you and will be the only ones who will have a chance to talk to you. All you’ll have to do will be to smile and take his arm and go up the aisle. This is the step we’re taking.” Sherrill stood away and went slowly forward. “You’ll see how the others do it. You’re clever, I can see. And when you get up there, all you’ve got to do is answer the questions and say things over after the minister, only using your own name instead of mine. Ten to one nobody will notice. You can speak in a low voice. The maid of honor will take your bouquet, and you’ll need to put out your left hand for the ring. Here! You must have the diamond, too!” and Sherrill slipped her beautiful diamond engagement ring off her finger and put it on Arla’s.

“Oh,” gasped Arla, “you’re wonderful! I can’t let you do all this!”

“Hold your head still!” commanded Sherrill. “This orange wreath droops a little too much over that ear. There! Isn’t that right? Really, you look a lot like me! I doubt if even the bridegroom will know the difference at first—wedding veils make such a change in one!”

“Oh, but,” gasped Arla, “Carter will know me; I’m sure he will! And suppose, suppose he should make a scene!”

“He won’t!” said Sherrill sharply. “He hasn’t the nerve!” she added cryptically, and suddenly knew that it was true and she had never known it before.

“But if he should!”

“He won’t!” said Sherrill more surely. “And if he does we’ll all be in it, so you won’t be alone.”

“Oh! Will you be there, too?” Arla said it in a tone of wonder and relief.

“Why, of course,” said Sherrill in the tone of a mother reproving a child. “I’ll be there, perhaps before you are.”

“Oh, why don’t you go with me?”

“That would be a situation, wouldn’t it?” commented Sherrill sarcastically. “Former bride and substitute bride arrive together! For heaven’s sake, don’t weep on that satin—it’s bad luck! And don’t talk about it anymore, or you’ll have me crying, too, and that would be just too bad! Here! Take your bouquet. No, hold it on this arm, and your veil and train over the other, now! All set? I’m turning off this light, and you must go out and walk right down the steps quickly. They are all the caterer’s people out there; they won’t know the difference. You really look a lot like me. For mercy’s sake, don’t look as if you were going to your own funeral. Put on a smile and wear it all the evening. And listen! You tell Mr. McArthur as soon as you get in the car on the way back with him, that if he plays any tricks or doesn’t treat you right, or doesn’t bring you back smiling to your reception, then I’ll tell everybody here the whole truth! I’ll tell it to everybody that knows him! And I mean what I say!”

“Oh!” gasped Arla, with a dubious lifting of the trouble in her eyes, and then, “Oh! Do we have to come back for the reception? Can’t we just disappear?”

“If you disappear, the whole story will come out in the papers tomorrow morning! I’ll see to that!” threatened Sherrill ominously. “I’m not going to be made a fool of. But if you come back and act like sane people and go away in the usual manner, it will just be a good joke that we have put over for reasons of our own, see? Now go, quick! We mustn’t get them all worked up because you are so late!”

Sherrill snapped out the light and threw open the door, stepping back into the shadow herself and watching breathlessly as Arla took the first few hesitating steps. Then as she grew more confident, stepping off down the hall, disappearing down the stairs, Sherrill closed the door and went over to the window that overlooked the front door.

The front steps were a blaze of light, and she could see quite plainly the caterer’s man who was acting as footman, standing by and helping a vision in white into the car. The door slammed shut, and the car drove away with a flourish. Sherrill watched till it swept around the curve and went toward the gateway. Then she snapped on a tiny bed light and gathered in haste a few things, her black velvet evening wrap, her pearl evening bag, a small sheet of notepaper, and her gold pencil. She would have to write a note to Aunt Pat. Her mind was racing on ahead! The keys to her own little car! Where had she put them? Oh yes, in the drawer of her desk. Had she forgotten anything?

The bride’s car had barely turned into the street before Sherrill went with swift quiet steps back through those two rooms again, into the back hall, cautiously out through the window that Arla had left open, onto the fire escape, and down into the side yard.

It was but the work of a moment to unlock her door of the garage. Fortunately the chauffeur was not there. He had taken Aunt Pat, of course, and everybody who would have known her was at the church. With trembling fingers she started her car, backed out the service drive, and whirled away to the church.

She threaded her way between the big cars parked as far as she could see either way from the church. Could she manage to get hidden somewhere before the service really began?

Breathlessly she drove her car into a tiny place on the side street, perilously near to a fire hydrant, and recklessly threw open her door. The police would be too busy out in the main avenue to notice perhaps, and anyway she could explain to them afterward. Even if she did have to pay a fine, she must get into that church.

A hatless young man in a trim blue serge suit was strolling by as she plunged forth from her car, and fortunately, for she caught the heel of her shoe in the billowy taffeta that was much too long for driving a car, and would have gone headlong if he had not caught her.

“I beg your pardon,” he said pleasantly as he set her upon her feet again. “Are you hurt?”

“Oh no!” said Sherrill, smiling agitatedly. “Thank you so much. You saved me from a bad fall. I was just in a terrible hurry,” and she turned frantic eyes toward the looming side of the church across the street. The young man continued to keep a protective arm about her and eye her anxiously.

“You’re sure you’re not hurt?” he asked again. “You didn’t strike your head against the running board?”

“No!” she gasped breathlessly, trying to draw away. “I’m quite all right. But please, I must hurry. I am late now.”

“Where do you want to go?” he asked, shifting his hand to her elbow and taking a forward step with her.

“Over there”—she motioned frantically—“to the church. I must get in before the ceremony begins.”

“You ought to wait until you get your breath,” he urged.

“I can’t! I’ve got to get there!” and she tried to pull away from him and fly across the street. But he kept easy pace with her, helping her up to the curb.

“Don’t you want to go around to the front door?” he said as she turned toward the side entrance.

“No!” she said, her heart beating so fast that it almost choked her. “This little side door. I want to get up to the choir loft.”

“Well, I’m coming with you!” he announced, fairly lifting her up the steps. “You’re all shaken up from that fall. You’re trembling! Can I take you to your friends? You’re not fit to be alone.”

“I’m—all—right!” panted Sherrill, fetching a watery smile and finding the tears right at hand.

“Don’t hurry!” he commanded, circling her waist impersonally with a strong arm and fairly lifting her up the narrow winding stair that led to the choir loft. “You’ve plenty of time. Don’t you hear? Those are the preliminary chords to the wedding march. The bride must be just at the door! Take it slow and easy!”

They arrived at the top of the stair in an empty choir loft. It was a church of formal arrangement, with the organ console down out of sight somewhere and the choir high above the congregation, visible only when standing to sing, and then only to one who dared to look aloft.

The whole quiet place was fully screened by plumy palms, and great feathery tropical ferns, and not even a stray from the street had discovered this vantage point from which to watch the ceremony. They had it all to themselves. No curious eyes could watch the face of the agonized bride-that-was-to-have-been.

Sherrill nestled in wearily against the wall behind the thickest palm, where yet she could peer through and see everything. She thanked her unknown friend pantingly with a hasty fervor, and then forgot he was still beside her.

Breathlessly she leaned forward, looking down, catching a glimpse of the bridegroom as he stood tall and handsome beside the best man, a smile of expectancy upon his face. Her bridegroom, watching for her to come! Her heart contracted and a spasm of pain passed over her face. She mustn’t, oh, she mustn’t cry! This wasn’t her wedding! This was something she must nerve herself to go through. This was something tragic that must move aright or all the future would be chaos.

Then she remembered and her eyes turned tragically, alertly, down the aisle to the front door, her hand unconsciously pressed against her heart in a quick little frantic motion.

Yes, the bride had arrived! Of course she might have known that or the wedding march would not be ringing out its first stately measures! Yes, there was the huddle of rainbow-colored dresses that were the bridesmaids. How glad she was that none of them were really intimate friends. All of them new friends from Aunt Pat’s circle of acquaintances. Her own girlhood friends were all too poor or too far away to be summoned. The first of them, the pink ones, were stepping forward now, slowly differentiating themselves from the mass of color, beginning the procession with measured, stilled tread; and back in the far dimness of the hall, silhouetted against the darkness of the out-of-doors, she could see the mist of whiteness that must be the bride, with the tall dark cousin beside her. Yes, the bride had come. Sherrill’s secret fear that she might somehow lose her nerve and escape on the way to the church was unfounded. This girl really wanted Carter enough to go through this awful ordeal to get him! Besides, a girl couldn’t very well run away and hope to escape detection in a bridal gown. Sherrill felt a hysterical laugh coming to her lips that changed into a quiver of tears, and a little shiver that ran down her back. And then suddenly she felt that strong arm again just under her elbow, supporting her, just as her knees began to manifest a tendency to crumple under her.

“Oh, thank you!” she breathed softly, letting her weight rest on his arm. “I’m—a little—nervous—I guess!”

“You aren’t fit to stand!” he whispered. “I wonder if I couldn’t find you a chair down there in the back room?”

She shook her head.

“It wouldn’t be worthwhile,” she answered, “the ceremony will soon be over. You are very kind, but I’ll be all right.”

He adjusted his arm so it would better support her, and somehow it helped and calmed her to feel him standing there. She had no idea how he looked or who he was. She hadn’t really looked at him. She just knew he was kind, and that he was a stranger who didn’t know a thing about her awful predicament. If he had been a friend who knew, she couldn’t have stood with him there. But it was like being alone with herself to have him staying there so comfortingly. After it was over she would never likely see him again. She hoped he would never know who she was nor anything about it. She hadn’t really thought anything about him as a personality. He was just something by the way to lean upon in her extremity.

The pink bridesmaids were halfway up the middle aisle now, the green at the formal distance behind, the violet just entering past the first rank of seats with the blue waiting behind. Their faces wore the set smile of robots endeavoring to do their best to keep the step. There was no evidence so far that either the wedding party or the audience had discovered anything unusual about this wedding or unexpected about the bride. She suddenly gasped at the thought of the gigantic fraud that she was about to perpetrate. Had she a right to do this? But it was too late to think about that now.

Sherrill’s eyes went back to the bridegroom standing there waiting, his immaculate back as straight and conventional as if nothing out of the ordinary had occurred a half hour before. She remembered with a stab of pain the powder that he had brushed from his left lapel. Was there any trace of it left? She had a sudden sick faint feeling as if she would like to lay her head down and close her eyes. She reeled just a tiny bit, and the young man by her side shifted his arms, putting the right one unobtrusively about her so that he could better steady her, and putting his left hand across to support her elbow. She cast him a brief little flicker of a smile of gratitude, but her eyes went swiftly back to the slow procession that was advancing up the aisle, so slow it seemed to her like the march of the centuries.

The bride was standing in the doorway now, just behind the yellow-clad maid of honor, her hand lying on the arm of the distant cousin, her train adjusted perfectly; no sign on the face of the maid of honor that she had noticed it was the wrong bride whom she had just prepared for her appearance. They didn’t know it yet! Nobody knew what was about to happen except herself! The thought was overwhelming!

Suddenly her eyes were caught by the little figure in gray down in the front seat. Aunt Pat! Poor Aunt Pat! What would she think? And after all her kindness, and the money she had spent to make this wedding a perfect one of its kind! She must do something about Aunt Pat at once!

Her trembling fingers sought the catch of her handbag and brought out pencil and paper. The young man by her side watched her curiously, sympathetically. Who was this lovely girl? What had stirred her so deeply? Had she perhaps cared for the bridegroom herself, and not felt able to face the audience during the ceremony? Or was the bride her sister, dearly beloved, whom she could not bear to part from? They truly resembled one another, gold hair, blue eyes; at least he was pretty sure this one’s eyes were blue, as much as he could judge by the brief glimpse he had had of them here in the dimness of the gallery.

She was looking about for someplace to lay her paper, and there was none, because the gallery rail was completely smothered in palms.

“Here!” he said softly, sensing her need, and drew out a broad, smooth leather notebook from his pocket, holding it firmly before her, his other arm still about her.

So Sherrill wrote rapidly, with tense, trembling fingers:

Dear Aunt Pat:



I’m not getting married tonight. Please be a good sport, and don’t let them suspect you didn’t know. Please, dearest.



Sherrill



The young man beside her had to hold the notebook very firmly. He couldn’t exactly help seeing the hastily scrawled words, though he tried not to—he really did. He was an honorable young man. But he was also by this time very much in sympathy with this unknown lovely girl. However, he treated the whole affair in the most matter-of-fact way.

“You want that delivered?” he whispered.

“Oh, would you be so good?”

“Which one? The little old lady in gray right down here?”

“Oh, how did you know?” Sherrill met his sympathetic gaze in passing wonder.

“I saw you looking down at her,” he answered with a boyish grin. “You want her to read it before she leaves the church?”

“Oh yes, please! Could you do it, do you think?”

“Of course,” he answered with confidence. “Do you happen to know if there is a door at the foot of these stairs opening into the church?”

“Yes, there is,” said Sherrill.

“Well, there’s no one else in the seat all across to the side aisle. I don’t know why I couldn’t slide in there without being noticed while the prayer is going on.”

“Oh, could you do that?” said Sherrill with great relief in her eyes, and looking down quickly toward the front seat that stretched a vacant length across to the flower-garlanded aisle. “Would you mind? It would be wonderful! But there’s a ribbon across the seat.”

He grinned again socially.

“It would take more than a ribbon to keep me out of a seat I wanted to get into. Are you all right if I leave you for a minute?”

“Of course!” said Sherrill, drawing herself up and trying to look self-sufficient. “Oh, I can never thank you enough!”

“Forget it!” said the young man. “Well, I’d better hurry down and reconnoiter. Sure you’re all right?”

“Sure.” She smiled tremulously.

He was gone, and Sherrill realized that she felt utterly inadequate without him. But suddenly she knew that the procession had arrived at the altar and disposed itself in conventional array. Startled, she looked down upon them. Did nobody know yet? She should have been watching Carter’s face. But of course he would have had his back to her. She could not have told what he was feeling from just his back, could she?

She moved a little farther and could see his face now between the next two palms, and it was white as death, white and frightened! Did she imagine it? No, she felt sure. He had swung half reluctantly around into his place beside Arla, but he lifted his hand to his mouth as if to steady his lips, and she could see that his hand trembled. Didn’t the audience see that? They would. They could not help it. But they would likely lay it to the traditional nervousness all bridegrooms were supposed to feel. Still, Carter! He was always so utterly confident, so at his ease anywhere. How could they credit him with ordinary nervousness?

But the ceremony was proceeding now, her bridegroom, Carter McArthur, getting married to another girl, and there she was above him, unseen, watching.

“Dearly beloved, we are gathered together in the sight of God and in the presence of this company to join together this man and this woman in the bonds of holy matrimony—”