“My eyes are not as good as yours, Mr. Lauriston,” he said; “I should not know my own son at that distance.” “There was a lady--a woman with him,” said George. “A woman whom you know?” asked the lawyer, whose interest in the matter, however, seemed to have diminished. “I think not.” “Then there is nothing extraordinary in the circumstance.” “What does the man want at my wedding?” “All friends of the parties find weddings interesting. Perhaps you misjudge this Eastern gentleman. He has called at my office to give me a letter for the Countess, and he expressed the most kindly sentiments towards you. See, Mrs. Lauriston seems impatient.” The two gentlemen were conversing in a low voice just within the vestry door. Nouna had slipped past them into the body of the church, and stood in an unusually quiet and pensive mood gazing at the altar where she had lately knelt. George shook himself free from a crowd of bewildering questions that were forcing themselves into his mind, and called to her. “Nouna, come and sign the register.” “I’ve done it,” “She has done so,” answered she and the lawyer together. “I didn’t see you.” “I did it while you were talking,” said she, quickly. “Yes, yes, it’s all right; the lady signed her name,” broke in the vicar, who thought he was never going to get rid of them. So George, hurried away by wife, lawyer, and vicar, did not see Nouna’s first and last signature of her maiden name. CHAPTER XII. The minutes that had been wasted in waiting for the vicar before the wedding, and in conversing with Mr. Angelo after it, had placed George Lauriston in a singular position: there was not time enough left to drive with his bride to the apartments he had taken for her in a street near Wilton Place, and then to return to the barracks and put on his uniform before parade. He must either risk being late for his duty for the first time, or miss the pleasure of himself introducing his young wife to her new home. His mind was made up before he reached the church-door. He had a superstition, the more influential that he felt his own weakness where his wife was concerned, against beginning his married life by a breach of discipline. Bending down over his little bride, who was leaving the church much more sedately than she had entered it, as if the solemnity of the married state had already begun to work its sobering influence upon her, he said, very low and very tenderly: “Nouna, my darling, what would you say if I asked you to go to our new home by yourself and wait for me there? If I told you I could not go there now straight with you without neglecting my duty?” “Say!” said the small bride, lifting up a dismayed face suddenly, and speaking in a tremulous voice above the pitch usually considered decorous in a church. “Why, I should say, never mind your duty, but come with me.” George would not accept such a portent as this, natural as the little heart-cry undoubtedly was.