Amanda married Martin that May, when the cherry blossoms transformed

the orchard into a sea of white.

To the rear of the farmhouse stood a plot of ground planted with cherry

trees. Low grass under the trees and little paths worn into it led like

aisles up and down. There, near the centre of the plot, Amanda and

Martin chose the place for the ceremony. The march to and from that

spot would lead through a white-arched aisle sweet with the breath of

thousands of cherry blossoms.

Amanda selected for her wedding a dress of white silk. "I do want a

wedding dress I can pack away in an old box on the attic and keep for

fifty years and take out and look at when it's yellow and old," she

said, romance still burning in her heart.

"Uh," said practical Millie. "Why, there ain't no attic in that house

you're goin' to! Them bungalows ain't the kind I like. I like a real

house."

"Well, there's no garret like ours, but there is a little raftered room

with a slanting ceiling and little windows and I intend to put trunks

and boxes in it and take my spinning-wheel that Granny gave me and put

it there."

"A spinning-wheel! What under the sun will you do with that?"

"Look at it," was the strange reply, at which Millie shook her head and

went off to her work.

"Are you going to carry flowers, and have a real wedding?" Philip asked

his sister the day before the wedding.

"I don't need any, with the whole outdoors a mass of bloom. If the pink

moccasins were blooming I'd carry some."

"Pink--with your red hair!" The boy exercised his brotherly prerogative

of frankness.

"Yes, pink! Whose wedding is this? I'd carry pink moccasins and wear my

red hair if they--if the two curdled! But I'll have to find some other

wild flowers."

He laughed. "Then I'll help you pick them."

"Martin and I are going for them, thanks."

"Oh, don't mention it! I wouldn't spoil that party!" He began whistling

his old greeting whistle. He had forgotten it for several years but

some chord of memory flashed it back to him at that moment.

At the sound of the old melody Amanda stepped closer to the boy.

"Phil," she said tenderly, "you make me awful mad sometimes but I like

you a lot. I hope you'll be as happy as I am some day."

"Ah," he blinked, half ashamed of any outward show of emotion. "You're

all right, Sis. When I find a girl like you I'll do the wedding ring

stunt, too. Now, since we've thrown bouquets at each other let's get to

work. What may I do if I'm debarred from the flower hunt?"

"Go ask Millie."




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