If Bess felt any displeasure or annoyance her manner nor her reply did not betray it. Her greater concern, seemingly, was whether or no Henry West would be home in time to attend the ceremony. Two days before he had received word from a distant part of the range that some trouble among the stock demanded his immediate attention. As he hastily bade her good-bye, he said he hoped to be back on the fifteenth, or at least in time to say good-bye before she and Berenice should take their departure. CHAPTER XXVI A WEDDING DAY At last the morning dawned. Berenice Morton sprang out of bed and hastened to scan the sky. Roseate beauty, softened by a line of tinted clouds, gladdened all the east. The rugged outline of the mountains lay clear-cut against the flaming sky. The sun heralded the new-born day with wondrous grandeur. The entranced spectator turned with an exclamation of joy, but discovered that Bess was still in profound sleep. She took a step forward to awaken her, but refrained, as she thought how worn out the girl must be after all the strenuous labor of decorating the rooms the day before. So soundly had she herself slept that she did not know that Bess had not closed her eyes until dawn. All through the night her mind ran from one thing to another. Once she was seized by the same pain, grown so frequent of late, which filled her with fear,—but fear for what she could not analyze. Berenice quietly drew the shades and, hastily dressing, left the room. Mrs. West also thought it wise to let the sleeper rest as long as she could, that she might be able to meet the strain of the day. At the first stir she heard, Berenice ran upstairs with a dainty breakfast. It was late, dreadfully so—nine o’clock, Bess noticed, as she stretched and yawned with no apparent concern. “Come, Old Sleepy! You better hurry, or Mr. Davis will have to be entertained by me when he arrives!” “Berenice, please find James and tell him that he must receive and entertain—a—Mr. Davis, as I shall be too busy getting into my ‘gordeous’ robes, as ‘Peter Pan’ would say,” said Bess, half jestingly, as she began to make her toilet. “Hurry back, dear, as I cannot dress without you,” she called from the banister as Berenice ran down the steps. Presently Mrs. West came into the girl’s room with the announcement that everything was ready,—the luncheon table, the salad, the dessert,—everything. Father Damien had come an hour ago and was resting in the library. “Now, all we are waiting for is the bridegroom and the hour of noon,” laughed Mrs. West, as she took Bess into her motherly arms and held her tightly for a moment. Bess snuggled close and said, with half a sigh, “Oh—h—little Mother; I half wish he would not come! I am afraid, I dread assuming this awful responsibility!” “Why—child—how strangely you talk! Surely, you are not in earnest!”