Nedra | Page 5

then the--calamity. I know it will
be a calamity. I can't get through it alive."
"You poor boy! I wish we could have a quiet little Wedding. It would
be so sweet, wouldn't it, dear?" she said plaintively, wistfully.
"But instead we are to have a hippodrome. Bah!" he concluded
spitefully. "I wouldn't talk this way, dear, if I didn't know that you feel
just as I do about it. But," and here he arose wearily, "this sort of talk
isn't helping matters. It's a case of church against choice. To-morrow
night we'll tell 'em, and then we'll quit sleeping for two months."
"There's only one way out of it that I can see. We might elope," she
said laughingly, standing before him and rubbing the wrinkles from
between his eyes.

Gradually his gray eyes fell until they looked into hers of brown. A
mutual thought sprang into the eyes of each like a flash of light plainly
comprehensive. He seized her hands, still staring into her eyes, and an
exultant hope leaped to his lips, bursting forth in these words:
"By George!"
"Oh, we couldn't," she whispered, divining his thought.
"We can! By all that's good and holy, we'll elope!" Hugh's voice was
quivering with enthusiasm, his face a picture of relief.
"Honestly, do you--do you think we could?" The girl's eyes were wide
with excitement, her cheeks burning.
"Can we? What's to prevent? Will you do it, Grace--will you?" cried
he.
"What will everybody say?"
"Let 'em say. What do we care? Won't it be the greatest lark that ever
happened? You're the smartest woman in the world for thinking of it."
"But I wasn't in earnest," she protested.
"But you are now--we both are. Listen: We can slip away and get
married and nobody will be the wiser and then, when we come back,
we can laugh at everybody."
"And get our pictures in the papers."
"Then, by Hokey! we won't come back for five years! How's that?
That'll fool 'em, won't it? Say, this is great! Life is worth living after all.
You'll go, won't you, Grace?"
"I'd go to the end of the world with you, Hugh, but--"
"Oh, say you'll go! Now, listen to this," he urged, leaping to his feet.
"We're going to be married anyway. We love one another. You can't be

married until the twenty-third of May. Lots of people elope--even in the
best of families. Why shouldn't we? If we stay here, we'll have to face
all the sort of thing we don't like--"
"Yes, but it won't take us two months to elope," she protested. "Sh!
Don't speak above a whisper. Aunt Elizabeth has wonderful ears."
"By Jove, darling, I believe you're two-thirds willing to try it on," he
whispered.
"We must be sensible, Hugh. You see, I can't be married until the
twenty-third of May. Well, aunt is determined to announce the
engagement to-morrow night. Don't you see we couldn't elope until the
twenty-second at best, so we're doomed for two months of it in spite of
ourselves. If we get through the two months why should we elope at all?
The worst will be over?"
"We can't escape the announcement party, I'll admit, but we can get
away from all the rest. My scheme is to elope to a place that will
require seven or eight weeks' time to reach. That's a fine way to kill
time, don't you see?"
"My goodness!"
"Why not? We can do as we like, can't we? And what a bully lark! I'd
be a downright cad to ask you to do this, Grace, if I didn't love you as I
do. We can use assumed names and all that!"
"Oh, dear, dear, doesn't it sound lovely?" she cried, her cheeks red with
excitement.
"The twenty-third of May isn't so far off after all, and it won't be half so
far if we're doing something like this. Will you go?"
"If I only could! Do you really think we--we could?"
"Whoop!" he shouted, as he seized her in his arms and rained kisses
upon her face. Then he held her off and looked into her eyes for a

moment. Then he gave another whoop, kissed her, released her and did
a wild dance about the room. She stood beside the big chair, equally as
excited, laughing unrestrainedly at his hilarity. At last he brought up at
the other side of the chair.
"But where could--I mean, shall we elope to?" she finally asked.
"Anywhere. Bombay--Australia? Let's make it a stunner, dear--let's do
it up right."
"And be married away over there? Oh, Hugh!"
"Certainly. They can marry us over there as well as anywhere. Here, I'll
write the names of ten places and we'll draw one from my hat." He sat
down before a table