There was still another element of interest in the marriage-party in the person of Mr. Evans, who ran down from Hampstead for it. "If Mr. Evans comes," Maud said, with the characteristic fine common sense of the Jamiesons, "I want you all to understand that it is all quite over between him and me. But what I have always thought about Mr. Evans is this--that he is the sort of man who would like The Family, and I do not see why he should not take a fancy to one of the other members of it. I am quite sure his affection for me was based upon my suitability. He often told me, for instance, that he would like a wife who had been brought up to do things for herself, and could manage on a small income and dress cheaply, and I am sure we can all do that. And after all, if that is so, one of us is as suitable as another. He had very definite ideas about a wife; but I couldn't help feeling all the time that it was some one like ourselves that he had in his mind. He seemed to have a great dread of any one who was too smart; and I said to him at the time--for of course we both talked about our families a good deal, as one does in the first stages--that we were all very homely sort of people. I could always put myself in the background if he seemed, for instance, to take a fancy to Gracie. And Gracie herself has often said that she thinks she would like a man to wear a white watered-silk waistcoat."
Gracie looked quite pleased with the arrangement, and Mr. Evans was asked down "as a friend." And I should here like to record--only of course it is going too far ahead--that before the summer was over, Mr. Evans, charmed with The Family, as Maud felt he would be, and convinced of their suitability, had chosen Gracie from amongst the remaining Miss Jamiesons who were still at the disposal of those who seek a wife. Gracie's energy charmed Mr. Evans. He often said afterwards that he believed he had got the pick of the basket after all.
It was quite evident to me, and I believe to most of the Jamiesons' guests, that one of the mysteries, so dear to the hearts of Stowel, was in preparation for the wedding afternoon. Not even my sister and I had been initiated into the secret; but Mrs. Jamieson, it must be confessed, took away from the shock of surprise which might have been ours, by referring during the whole afternoon to the entertainment which was to take place later. The Jamiesons had decided that the lawn, newly mown, was to be suddenly cleared of trestle-tables and garden-chairs, and that a small band of musicians was to spring up unexpectedly out of the ground, as it were, and that every one was to know suddenly that they were in the midst of an impromptu dance. Now Mrs. Jamieson, nervously expectant, and half fearing from the detached manners of her daughters (so well did the Miss Jamiesons simulate their ignorance of what was before them) that they must indeed have forgotten about the dance, interrupted every conversation by creeping up to them in her melancholy, quiet way, and saying, "Shall I get them to clear away now?"