The French fashion prescribing that the family
_cortege _shall follow the bride to the altar, the vestibule of the
church was thronged with the participatore in the coming procession;
but if Mr. Newell felt any nervousness at his sudden projection into
this unfamiliar group, nothing in his look or manner betrayed it. He
stood beside Garnett till a white-favoured carriage, dashing up to
the church with a superlative glitter of highly groomed horseflesh
and silver-plated harness, deposited the snowy apparition of the
bride, supported by her mother; then, as Hermione entered the
vestibule, he went forward quietly to meet her.
The girl, wrapped in the haze of her bridal veil, and a little
confused, perhaps, by the anticipation of the meeting, paused a
moment, as if in doubt, before the small oddly-clad figure which
blocked her path--a horrible moment to Garnett, who felt a pang of
misery at this satire on the infallibility of the filial instinct.
He longed to make some sign, to break in some way the pause of
uncertainty; but before he could move he saw Mrs.
Pages:
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131