different.
“You see,” said Aunt Pat suddenly, right into the midst of her thoughts, “James and I went out to this church a great many years ago. We started quite early Sunday morning for a walk to get away from everybody else for a while. We didn’t plan where we were going—or at least, maybe James did—he was like that; he thought of nice things and planned them out ahead—but we just started along the road.”
Sherrill turned bright, interested eyes on her sweet old aunt.
“We held hands,” confessed Miss Patricia with a little pink tinge stealing into her soft roseleaf cheek. “It was very early when we started, and there were no people about, not even a carriage on the road. We had a wonderful time. I had some caraway cookies in my silk bag that hung from my arm by little velvet ribbons. Soon there was dust on my best shoes, but I didn’t care. We stopped before we went into church, and James dusted them off. There were narrow velvet ribbon laces to my shoes, crossed at the ankle and tied in a little tassel bow.”
Aunt Pat’s eyes were sweet and dreamy.
“We talked about what we would do when we were married,” went on the sweet old voice. “We planned a house with pillars and a great window on the stairs. I was going to do my own work. I had written down a list of things James liked to eat, and I was learning to cook them.”
“Oh,” said Sherrill, bright-eyed, “it’s just like a storybook.”
“Yes, it was,” said Aunt Pat. “I was very happy. We walked a good many miles, but I wasn’t tired. I didn’t get tired in those days, of course, but James slipped my hand through his arm, and that made it like walking on clouds!”
“Dear Aunt Pat!” breathed Sherrill.
“When we came to that little white church, we knew we had come to the place we had been looking for, though we hadn’t known what it was or where it was. But it was our church. We both exclaimed over it at once.”
Sherrill nestled her hand in her aunt’s hand.
“It was still early when we got there. The old sexton was just ringing the first bell, and it sounded out over the hills like music. The bell may have been out of tune, but it sounded sweeter than any orchestra has ever seemed to me. We went and sat on a flat gravestone in the little cemetery under a tall elm tree and ate our seed cakes, and James put his arm around me and kissed me right there in the graveyard. It made me glad with a deep sweet gladness I had never felt before. It seemed just like heaven. And a bird high up sang a wonderful song that went through my heart with a sweet pain.”
The little old lady had forgotten for the moment that Sherrill was there. Her eyes were dreamy and faraway.
“People ought never to get married unless they feel like that about each other, Sherry.”
“No,” said Sherrill, still gravely, “I don’t think I did. I was just happy. Having a good time!”
There was a long minute of stillness; then Sherrill said shyly, “Tell the rest, please, Aunt Patricia.”
“Well,” said the old lady, her eyes still on the faraway, “after a while the people began to come. They drove up in buggies and carriages, and a few in old farm wagons with boards across the sides, for seats, and carpet on the boards. Then we got up and walked around among the white stones and read the names and dates until the sexton rang the second bell, and then we went in. A young girl with a pink ribbon and daisies on her hat played an old cabinet organ, and I remember they sang ‘Nearer, My God, to Thee,’ and God seemed very near to us and we to Him.”
“Yes?” said Sherrill, nestling closer in a pause.
“We sat in the very last seat back by the door,” went on the sweet old voice, “and James held my hand under the folds of my ruffles. I had on a very wide bayadere striped silk skirt with three deep flounces, and they flowed over the seat beautifully. I can remember the strong warm feel of his hand now.”
The tears began suddenly to come into Sherrill’s eyes.
“We sat all through that service hand in hand and nobody the wiser,” said Aunt Pat with a bit of her old chuckle, and then a softened