“Good God, good God!” he said to himself. Not till he had actually seen her had he been able to realize what had happened; to understand what manner of change had come into his life; to see what might have been, and what was. He had so many things to tell her, which might never now be told. The blind, choking rage of a baffled creature came over him; he sped on, stifled, through the darkness. Judith, sitting dazed and smiling in the gaslight, said over and over again in her heart: “Oh my poor Reuben, my poor, poor Reuben!” At the piano Rose and Jack sang in chorus: “For he’s going to marry, Yum Yum, Yum Yum. Your anger pray bury, For all will be merry, I think you had better succumb, cumb--cumb!” * * * * * At the beginning of January there was a wedding at the synagogue in Upper Berkeley Street which excited unusual interest. The beautiful bride in her white silk dress was greatly admired. She was very pale, certainly, and in her wide-open eyes an acute observer might have read an expression of something like terror; but acute observers, fortunately, are few and far between. The bridegroom, to all appearance, enjoyed himself immensely, going through the whole pageant with great exactness, smashing the wine-glass vigorously with his little foot, and sipping the wine daintily from the silver cup. Old Solomon Sachs, whose own daughters had been married in the drawing-room at Portland Place, but who had no prejudice against the new fashion of weddings in the synagogue, occupied a prominent place near the ark, surrounded by his family. Reuben Sachs stood close to Leopold Leuniger, a little in the background. His face was absolutely expressionless, unless weariness may be allowed to count as expression. He wanted yet a year or two of thirty, and already he was beginning to lose his look of youth. Leo, it must be owned, paid little attention to the ceremony. His eyes roved constantly to where the bridegroom’s family, the Lee-Harrisons and the Norwoods, stood together in a rather chilly group; to where, in particular, Lady Geraldine Sydenham, in her unassertive, unaccentuated costume, leaned lightly against a porphyry column. Bertie’s people had accepted the situation with philosophy, and were really fond of Judith, but they found her family, especially in its collateral branches, uncongenial, if not worse. On the outskirts of this group hovered Montague Cohen, absolutely rigid with importance. Near him Adelaide tossed her head in its smart new bonnet from side to side, her sallow face and diamond earrings flashing this way and that throughout the ceremony. She knew that such restlessness was not good manners, but for the life of her she could not resist the temptation of seeing all that was to be seen.