Nan of the Gypsies

Nan laughed happily. “But Robert,” she said, “ought there not to be a trousseau before one is married?”

“Elenan.” It was Monsieur Alecsandri who was speaking. “I was so confident I would find you, that I brought a trunk full of garments that were your dear mother’s. It was the trousseau which I had provided for her when I betrothed her to a descendant of Prince Couza. The gowns are the loveliest that I could procure, but they were never worn.”

“Oh, Uncle Basil.” (He had asked the girl to call him by his Christian name.) “How glad I shall be to have them.”

“But, Nan comrade,” Robert repeated, “you have not yet said that I may plan our wedding and our trip away.”

The girl looked at the lad who was seated on the lounge at her side and said brightly, “Robert, you plan it all and let it be a surprise for me.”

Nan noticed that during the hour that followed Robert glanced at his watch and several times walked toward the window and gazed out toward the highway.

“Why are you so restless, son?” his mother had just inquired, when wheels were heard in the drive, and soon after the call of the heavy iron knocker resounded through the house. Robert half arose, but sank back to the lounge when he saw Mrs. Sperry going to the front door.

“Who can it be?” Little Miss Dahlia was quite in a flutter, but Nan had heard a voice inquiring if Miss Anne Barrington was at home?

With a cry of joy Nan sprang forward and held the newcomer in a long and loving embrace. “Phyllis, I can’t believe that it is you!” she cried as she stood back to survey the pretty, laughing face of her dearest friend. “Why, it seems too much like a story book to be really true.”

Then she led the newcomer into the library where she was gladly welcomed by all who knew her and introduced by Nan to “my uncle, Monsieur Alecsandri.”

Phyllis, who never had believed that her room-mate was really a gypsy, took the arrival of an aristocratic uncle quite as a matter of course, and when they were all seated, Nan, still curious, exclaimed: “Do tell me how you happened to know that it was time to come to my wedding.”

Phyllis looked up at Robert with a mischievous twinkle in her blue eyes. “Shall I tell?” she asked.

“I’ll tell,” that lad replied. “Last week I wired my fair cousin to board a train at once for the West if she wished to attend our wedding which I hoped would be solemnized on Thanksgiving day.”

“Robert! How could you invite a guest to our wedding before you had asked me to marry you?” Nan laughingly declared.

“It was rather presumptuous,” the lad confessed, “but all’s well that ends well.”

Monsieur Alecsandri accepted Miss Barrington’s invitation to remain in her home, and Phyllis spent the night with Nan, for they had much to talk about. The latter maiden often fell to wondering what Robert’s surprising plan was for their wedding.

CHAPTER XXXVI.

NAN’S TROUSSEAU

The wedding day dawned gloriously. The two girls were up early and as soon as they were dressed, Nan drew her friend to the wide open window and they looked out at the garden, where masses of yellow chrysanthemums were glowing in the sunlight. Beyond, the wide silvery beach was glistening, and, over the gleaming blue water a flock of shining white sea gulls dipped and circled. Silently the two girls stood with arms about each other, and, in memory, Nan was again in the long ago. She was watching two children dressed in gypsy garb as they stood near the rushing, singing fountain. One was a dark, eager-eyed girl of thirteen, and the other was a mis-shapen, goblin-like boy of ten.

Tirol, dear little Tirol. How he had loved her, how he had clung to her! Tears gathered in the girl’s eyes as she thought of the little fellow and she hoped that, somehow he might know what a happy day this was to be for his dear Sister Nan.

“Look yonder!” Phyllis laughingly exclaimed, “Here comes a mounted messenger at full speed.”

“It’s Bobsy, the gardener’s son,” Nan said. “He has been for an early ride on my Binnie.”

The boy, chancing to see the two girls at the upper window, waved a letter, and, believing that he wished to give it to them, they went downstairs and out on the veranda.

The boy’s freckled face was beaming. “Mr. Robert sent this over,” he said jubilantly, “and he gave me a five dollar gold piece toward my new bicycle.”

Then away the boy galloped to tell this astounding news to his mother, while Nan opened the letter and read:

“Good morning to you, Lady Red Bird. Can you believe it? This is our wedding day! I want to shout and sing, but I have much to do before that most wonderful of all hours, today at high noon.

“Since you promised that I might plan everything, I am asking my Nan to be dressed in gypsy fashion. Then your kinsfolk and my kinsfolk are to meet under the pepper tree as the bells of the old mission tell the hour of noon. Last night as I went through the hedge, I told our tree the great honor that was to befall it, and this morning the birds in it are singing a riotous song of joy, and I am sure that the pepper berries are redder than ever before.

“Then, at two o’clock will come the real surprise and the beginning of our joyous journey. Nan comrade, may I prove worthy of you!

“Your“Robert.”

After breakfast Aunt Dahlia, Phyllis and Nan were wondering what the bride would wear for a wedding gown, when Monsieur Alecsandri returned from the station, whither he had gone at an early hour. A few moments later an expressman brought a trunk which was carried to Nan’s room. Then her uncle Basil smilingly handed her a key as he said: “Elenan, do me the honor of wearing one of the gowns that were prepared for your mother’s wedding.”

Nan was indeed puzzled to know how she could please her uncle Basil, and yet keep her promise to Robert.

When the trunk was opened and the garments which it contained had been spread about on bed, lounge and chairs, Nan turned to the older lady, her dark eyes aglow as she said, “Aunt Dahlia, dear, did you ever see fabrics more beautiful?”

“This one is especially lovely,” the little lady said as she smoothed the folds of a soft, white silk. “I wish you would try it on, dearie.”

And then, when the girl stood arrayed in the gown, Phyllis exclaimed, “Nan, that surely was made for your wedding dress.”

“But, Phyllis, you are forgetting Robert’s request.”

“No, I am not,” the other maid laughingly replied. Then for a moment she looked about the room thoughtfully. Spying the gorgeous scarlet and gold shawl, which in the long ago Manna Lou had given the girl, she took it and threw one fringed corner over Nan’s left shoulder, fastening it in front at the belt. Then, winding it about her waist, another point hung panelwise to the bottom of her skirt. The spangled yellow silk handkerchief was twined about the dark hair, and the picture reflected in the mirror was truly a beautiful one.

“Tres charmante!” Phyllis exclaimed jubilantly. “Now, let me see, there should be something old and something new, something borrowed and something blue. The dress is new, to us anyway; that gorgeous shawl is old. I’ll loan you a handkerchief with a yellow and crimson border, and now, what shall you wear that is blue?”

Miss Dahlia slipped from the room to return a moment later with a velvet box which she handed to the girl she so loved. “My mother gave it to me when I was eighteen,” the little lady said, “and I want to give it to my Nan on her wedding day.”

The dark head and the fair bent eagerly over the box and when the cover was removed, the two girls uttered exclamations of joy.

“Oh, how lovely, lovely!” Phyllis cried as she lifted a sapphire necklace and clasped it about the throat of the happy Nan.

A busy morning was spent by the two girls, and, as it neared noon, Nan resplendently arrayed, looked up at Phyllis as she said, “I wonder where Aunt Dahlia is. She hasn’t been here for half an hour past. Perhaps she is in her room. Wait dear, and I will see.”

Miss Barrington’s door was closed. Nan, after tapping, softly opened it. Miss Dahlia, with folded hands, was seated by the wide window gazing out at the sea and in her sweet grey eyes there was such a wistful loneliness. She looked up, as the girl entered, and smiled faintly, then her lips quivered and the tears came.

“Oh, Aunt Dahlia, darling! How selfish I have been!” Nan cried, as heedless of her white silk dress, she knelt by the little woman and put her arms lovingly about her. “I never thought! Perhaps you didn’t want me to get married. But it isn’t too late, Aunt Dahlia, if you do not wish it.”

“Dear little girl,” the old lady said tenderly, “of course I want you to be married. If I had searched the world over, I could not have chosen a lad whom I would like better. It is I who am selfish. I was fearing that Robert would take you away, and I don’t want to lose my Nan.”

“Lose me, Aunt Dahlia? Do you think that I would let you lose me? You are dearer to me than all the world, and where I go, you shall go, but we will always come back, won’t we dearie, back to our garden-all-aglow where we have been so happy. Hark, the first stroke of the mission bells is telling that it is noon, and we must not be late at our very own wedding. Yes, Phyllis we are coming.”

Monsieur Alecsandri was waiting for them in the library. Together they started along the flower bordered path toward the pepper tree, and Nan’s wedding music was the joyous song of the birds.

CHAPTER XXXVII.

NAN’S WEDDING

The ceremony was a simple one, but the solemnity, which Mrs. Widdemere feared would be absent, seemed to be enhanced by the peaceful beauty of the surroundings. All was hushed, not a bird sang nor a breeze stirred as reverently the two, arrayed as gypsies spoke the sacred words that made them man and wife. Then, when the rector from St. Martin’s-by-the-Sea had kissed the bride and congratulated the radiant Robert, he departed, leaving the kinsfolk alone. Nan turned first of all toward the little old lady in the silvery grey gown, who was smiling through tears, and she said joyously, “Aunt Dahlia darling, instead of losing your gypsy girl you have gained a gypsy boy.” Then going to Mrs. Widdemere, Nan kissed her affectionately and said very softly, “Mother.” Then turning to Monsieur Alecsandri she asked gayly, “Uncle Basil, what do you think of your nephew? Is he not a good looking Romany rye?”

That stately gentleman shook hands with Robert as he replied: “In Rumania there is not one who can excel him in manliness, and I know that he will care for my dear sister’s little girl as I would wish her cared for. I am indeed thankful, Elenan, that I arrived in time for your wedding. This afternoon I shall start on my homeward journey, hoping that in another year my niece and nephew, Mrs. Widdemere and Miss Barrington, will honor me with a long visit.” Then he added earnestly, “Elenan, always remember that your mother’s birthplace on the Danube River is as much your home as it is mine.”

Then Mrs. Widdemere invited them through the gate in the hedge and, to their surprise, there on the other side, still under the spreading branches of the great old pepper tree, was a bare board table on which an appetizing lunch was spread gypsy-wise.

It was one o’clock when the feast was over. Robert, for a moment alone with Nan, said softly, “Little wife, put on that old gypsy dress now, for at two we will start on our trip away for a fortnight.”

The girl looked up with a radiant smile as she said, “It shall be done, my husband.”

The intervening hour was a busy one, for Monsieur Alecsandri took his departure, and then Nan, with the help of Phyllis, packed the few things she would need. Hearing a soft footfall back of her, the gypsy girl whirled about and caught Miss Barrington in her arms and held her in a long, loving embrace.

“I’m so happy, Aunt Dahlia, so happy,” she said, “and just think what I would have missed from my life if you had not wanted to keep that wild little gothlin five years ago. I would never have had you to love, nor my best friend,” the girl hesitated, and then with laughing eyes she added, “nor my husband.”

“Hark!” Phyllis said. “I hear tinkling bells outside. What can it be?”

“It’s a gypsy van,” Nan cried joyfully, “and Robert is driving. That is the surprise and surely a delightful one.”

Five minutes later these two joyful gypsies started away in a covered wagon, two horses in the lead, and Binnie, and Robert’s saddle horse, Firefly, trailing behind. Phyllis was to remain with Aunt Dahlia during the fortnight and together they stood on the veranda waving until the gypsy van had turned into the highway. Nan looked up at the driver as she said happily, “Robert, this is a wonderful surprise.” Then she added with sudden wistfulness, “I wish Manna Lou might have been at our wedding, but Uncle Basil promised to tell her all about it and give her my grateful love.”

They were slowly ascending the mountain road, and, when they reached the ridge, Robert drew to one side and stopped. “Nan comrade,” he said, “I want to climb to the top, for, somehow, it seems as though that peak must be our shrine for thanksgiving.”

Then, when they reached the boulder where they had stood twice before, the lad took both of the girl’s hands and looking into the dark glowing eyes, he said, “Elenan may be a fine Rumanian lady, if she wishes, but the comrade whom I love and always shall love is my dear, brave little wife, Gypsy Nan.”

Then together, hand in hand, they went down the trail and soon the tinkling of bells was heard as the gypsy van slowly crossed over the ridge and down another mountain road, where, at sunset, these two would make camp in a picturesque canyon called Happy Valley.