Then he blamed himself roundly for his momentary suspicion, and went on hurriedly with the ceremony.
The man answered in a low, guarded voice.

There was a tone in it which somehow jarred on the good minister's sensitive nerves.

The girl's voice was pitifully fluttering, almost hysterical.
But that was not an uncommon occurrence.

Few brides are calm and self-possessed.
"You will please lift your veil for the final benediction," said the aged pastor, pausing, book in hand, and gazing at the slim, silent, dark-robed figure, who had made her responses faintly, gaspingly, almost inaudibly.

Again it was the stranger to the left who complied with his request, but for one instant both the clergyman and the old sexton caught sight of a face white as death, yet beautiful as an angel's, framed in a mass of dead-gold hair; but the flickering of the lamps caused strange shadows to flit over it.