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Page 100
"Looking at it that way, they haven't much to lose," I conceded.
"And no wedding cake," grieved Isabel, "and no reception at the house of
the bride's mother. And you can't have your picture in the _Queen_."
"There would be a difficulty," I said, "about the descriptive part."
"And no favours for the coachman, and no trousseau----"
"I wonder," I said, "whether, under those circumstances, it's really
worth while."
"Oh, well!" said Isabel.
"It's a night to Paris, and a morning to Dover," I said. "We will wait
for the others at Dover--I fancy they'll hurry--that'll be another day.
I'll take one _robe de nuit_, Isabel, three pocket handkerchiefs, one
brush and comb, and tooth brush. You shall have all the rest of the
bag."
"You are a perfect love," exclaimed Miss Portheris, with the most
touching gratitude.
"We will share the soap," I continued, "until you are married.
Afterwards----"
"Oh, you can have it then," said Isabel, "of course," and she looked at
the Castle of Rheinfels and blushed beautifully.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
"There was only one thing that disappointed me," Mrs. Malt was saying at
the dinner table of the Cologne hotel, "and that wasn't so much what you
would call a disappointment as a surprise. White windows-blinds in a
robber castle on the Rhine I did not expect to see."
I slipped away before momma had time to announce and explain her
disappointments, but I heard her begin. Then I felt safe, for criticism
of the Rhine is absorbing matter for conversation. The steamer's custom
of giving one stewed plums with chicken is an affront to civilisation to
last a good twenty minutes by myself. I tried to occupy and calm
Isabel's mind with it as we walked over to the station, under the twin
towers of the Cathedral, but with indifferent success. To add to her
agitation at this crisis of her life, the top button came off her glove,
and when that happened I felt the inutility of words.
We passed the policemen on the Cathedral square with affected
indifference. We believed we were not liable to arrest, but policemen,
when one is eloping, have a forbidding look. We refrained, by mutual
arrangement, from turning once to look back for possible pursuers, but
that is not a thing I would undertake to do again under similar
circumstances. We even had the hardihood to buy a box of chocolates on
the way, that is, Isabel bought them, while I watched current events at
the confectioner's door. The station was really only about seven
minutes' walk from the hotel, but it seemed an hour before I was able to
point out Dicky, alert and expectant, on the edge of the platform behind
the line of cabs.
"So near the fulfilment of his hopes, poor fellow," I remarked.
"Yes," concurred Isabel, "but do you know I almost wish he wasn't
coming."
"Don't tell him so, whatever you do," I exclaimed. "I know Dicky's
sensitive nature, and it is just as likely as not that he would take you
at your word. And I will not elope with you alone."
I need not have been alarmed. Isabel had no intention of reducing the
party at the last moment. I listened for protests and hesitations when
they met, but all I heard was, "_Have_ you got the bag?"
Dicky had the bag, the tickets, the places, everything. He had already
assumed, though only a husband of to-morrow, the imperative and
responsible connection with Isabel's arrangements. He told her she was
to sleep with her head toward the engine, that she was to drink nothing
but soda-water at any of the stations, and that she must not, on any
account, leave the carriage when we changed for Paris until he came for
her. It would be my business to see that these instructions were
carried out.
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