John Charrington’s Wedding

No one ever thought that May Forster would marry John Charrington; but he had a different idea, and things that John Charrington wanted usually happened. He asked her to marry him before he went to university. She laughed and said no. He asked her again when he came home. Again she laughed, shook her pretty blonde head, and said no. He asked her a third time; she said it was becoming a bad habit, and laughed at him more than ever.

John was not the only man who wanted to marry her: she was the most popular girl in our village, and we were all in love with her in a way; it was a trend, like wearing purple ties or big capes. So we were surprised and a bit upset when John Charrington came into our little local Club and told us all he was getting married.

“Your wedding?”

“You can’t be serious?”

“Who’s the lucky girl? When’s it happening?”

John Charrington filled his pipe and lit it before he answered. Then he said—

“I’m sorry to take away your only joke—but Miss Forster and I are getting married in September.”

“You can’t be serious?”

“He’s been rejected again, and it’s made him crazy.”

“No,” I said, standing up, “I can see it’s true. Can someone lend me a gun—or a ticket to a place very far away? Charrington has won over the only pretty girl in our area. Did you use magic, or a love potion, Jack?”

“Neither, sir, but something you’ll never have—perseverance—and the best luck a man can have.”

There was something in his voice that made me stop talking, and no one else could get him to say more.

The strange thing was that when we congratulated Miss Forster, she blushed and smiled and looked happy, as though she really was in love with him, and had been in love with him all along. I think she had been. Women are weird.

We were all invited to the wedding. In Brixham, everyone who was anyone knew everyone else who was someone. My sisters, I truly believe, were more interested in the wedding clothes than the bride herself, and I was going to be the best man. The upcoming marriage was talked about a lot at afternoon teas, and at our little Club above the saddle shop, and the question was always asked: “Does she love him?”

I used to ask that question myself at the beginning of their engagement, but after a certain night in August, I never asked it again. I was coming home from the Club through the churchyard. Our church is on a hill covered in thyme, and the grass around it is so thick and soft that you can’t hear footsteps.

I didn’t make any noise as I jumped over the low mossy wall, and walked between the gravestones. At that moment, I heard John Charrington’s voice, and saw her. May was sitting on a low flat gravestone, her face turned towards the bright western sun. Her face looked so in love that it ended any question of her love for him; it looked even more beautiful than usual.

John was lying at her feet, and his voice broke the quiet of the golden August evening.

“My dear, my dear, I believe I would come back from the dead if you needed me!”

I coughed right away to let them know I was there, and walked away into the shadow, fully understanding.

The wedding was planned for early September. Two days before, I had to go to the city for work. The train was late, which is usual, and as I stood there annoyed, checking my watch, I saw John Charrington and May Forster. They were walking up and down the quiet end of the platform, arm in arm, looking into each other’s eyes, not caring about the interest of the workers.

Of course I knew it was best to quickly hide myself in the ticket office, and I only came out when the train arrived at the platform. Then I walked past the couple with my bag, and took a seat in a first-class smoking-carriage. I did this pretending not to see them. I like to think I am careful, but if John was travelling alone I wanted to be with him. And that happened.

“Hello, old friend,” he said in a happy voice as he put his bag into my carriage; “this is lucky; I thought I would have a boring trip!”

“Where are you going?” I asked, still pretending not to look, even though I could see that her eyes were red.

“To visit Mr. Branbridge,” he replied, closing the door and leaning out for a last word with his girlfriend.

“Oh, I wish you wouldn’t go, John,” she was saying in a quiet, serious voice. “I feel sure something will happen.”

“Do you think I would let anything happen to stop me, when our wedding is the day after tomorrow?”

“Don’t go,” she answered, with a plea that would have made me leave the train. But she wasn’t talking to me. John Charrington rarely changed his mind.

He only stroked the little hands that were on the carriage door.

“I must, May. Mr. Branbridge has been very kind to me, and now he’s dying I must go and see him, but I will be back in time for——” the rest of the goodbye was lost in a whisper and the noise of the moving train.

“You’ll definitely come back?” she asked as the train started moving.

“Nothing will stop me,” he replied; and we left. After he had seen the last of her on the platform he sat back in his corner and was quiet for a while.

When he spoke, it was to tell me that his godfather, who he was going to inherit from, was dying at Peasmarsh Place, about fifty miles away, and had asked for John, and John had decided he had to go.

“I’ll definitely be back tomorrow,” he said, “or, if not, the day after, with plenty of time. Thank God, you don’t have to get up in the middle of the night to get married these days!”

“And what if Mr. Branbridge dies?”

“Whether he’s alive or dead I’m getting married on Thursday!” John replied, lighting a cigar and opening the newspaper.

At Peasmarsh station we said “goodbye,” and he left, and I saw him ride off; I went on to London, where I spent the night.

When I got home the next afternoon, which was very rainy, my sister asked me—

“Where’s Mr. Charrington?”

“I have no idea,” I replied in an annoyed way. Every man, since the beginning of time, has hated that kind of question.

“I thought you might have heard from him,” she continued, “since you’re going to be his best man tomorrow.”

“Isn’t he back?” I asked, because I had expected him to be here.

“No, Geoffrey,” my sister Fanny, who often made quick judgments about people, said, “he hasn’t come back, and what’s more, I’m sure he won’t. You’ll see, there’ll be no wedding tomorrow.”

My sister Fanny has a way of annoying me that no one else can do.

“You’ll see,” I replied sharply, “you should stop making a fool of yourself. There’ll be more weddings tomorrow than you’ll ever be a part of.” Which, by the way, turned out to be true.

But even though I could speak confidently to my sister, I felt worried when, late that night, I found out that John hadn’t returned home. I walked home in a bad mood in the rain. The next morning was beautiful with a blue sky, golden sun, and lovely clouds. I woke up with a strange feeling of worry from the night before, and I didn’t want to face that worry when I was fully awake.

But with my morning wash, I got a note from John that made me feel better and I went to the Forsters’ house feeling happy.

May was in the garden. I saw her blue dress through the flowers as I walked through the gate. So I didn’t go up to the house, but walked down the grassy path.

“He’s written to you too,” she said, without saying hello, when I got to her.

“Yes, I’m supposed to meet him at the station at three, and then go straight to the church.”

Her face looked pale, but there was a sparkle in her eyes, and a happy tremble around her mouth.

“Mr. Branbridge asked him to stay another night and he couldn’t say no,” she continued. “He is so kind, but I wish he hadn’t stayed.”

I was at the station at half-past two. I was a bit upset with John. It seemed disrespectful to the beautiful girl who loved him, that he would arrive in a rush, with the dust of travel on him, to take her hand, a hand that some of us would have given the best years of our lives to hold.

But when the three o’clock train came and left, and John wasn’t on it, I was more than upset. There was no other train for thirty-five minutes; I figured that, if we rushed, we could just get to the church in time for the ceremony; but, oh, what a fool to miss that first train! What other man could have done it?

Those thirty-five minutes felt like a year, as I walked around the station reading the ads and the timetables, and getting angrier and angrier with John Charrington. His confidence in always getting what he wanted, when he wanted it, was too much. I hate waiting. Everyone does, but I think I hate it more than anyone else. The three thirty-five train was late, of course.

I was so annoyed, I clenched my teeth and stomped my foot as I watched the signals. Click. The signal changed. Five minutes later I got into the carriage that I had brought for John.

“Go to the church!” I said, as someone closed the door. “Mr. Charrington didn’t come on this train.”

I was now worried instead of angry. What had happened to John? Could he have gotten sick suddenly? I had never known him to be sick for even a day. But he could have sent a message. Something terrible must have happened to him. The thought that he had let her down never crossed my mind, not even for a moment. Yes, something terrible had happened to him, and I had to tell his bride. I almost wished the carriage would crash and I would get hurt so that someone else would have to tell her, not me, who—but that’s not relevant to this story.

We arrived at the church gate five minutes before four. Eager people were lined up on both sides of the path from the gate to the church entrance. I quickly got out of the carriage and walked through them. Our gardener was standing near the door. I stopped.

“Are they still waiting, Byles?” I asked, just to have something to say, because I could tell from the way the crowd was standing that they were still waiting.

“Waiting, sir? No, no, sir; the wedding must be over by now.”

“Over! So Mr. Charrington came?”

“Right on time, sir; he must have missed you somehow. And, sir,” he lowered his voice, “I’ve never seen Mr. John like this before, but I think he’s been drinking a lot. His clothes were all dusty and his face was pale. I didn’t like the way he looked at all, and people inside are saying all kinds of things. You’ll see, something bad happened to Mr. John, and he’s been drinking. He looked like a ghost, and he walked straight in without saying hello to anyone; he’s usually such a gentleman!”

I’d never heard Byles talk so much. The crowd in the churchyard was whispering and getting ready to throw rice and slippers at the bride and groom. The bell-ringers were ready to start ringing the bells when the bride and groom came out.

A sound from the church announced them; they came out. Byles was right. John Charrington didn’t look normal. His coat was dusty, his hair was messy. It looked like he’d been in a fight, because there was a dark mark above his eyebrow. He was very pale. But he wasn’t paler than the bride, who looked like she was made of ivory—her dress, veil, orange blossoms, face, everything.

As they walked out, the bell-ringers got ready—there were six of them—and then, instead of the happy wedding bells, a slow, sad bell began to ring.

We all felt a shock of horror at such a bad joke from the bell-ringers. But the bell-ringers themselves let go of the ropes and ran out into the sunlight. The bride shivered, and her mouth turned grey, but the groom led her down the path where the people were standing with handfuls of rice; but the rice was never thrown, and the wedding bells never rang. Even when people asked the bell-ringers to correct their mistakes, they refused.

In a silence like the silence in a room where someone has died, the bride and groom got into their carriage and the door closed behind them.

Then people started talking. There was a lot of anger, surprise, and guessing from the guests and the people watching.

“If I’d known he was drunk, sir,” old Forster said to me as we left, “I would have knocked him down in the church, I swear, before I let him marry my daughter!”

Then he stuck his head out of the window.

“Drive fast,” he shouted to the driver; “don’t worry about the horses.”

He obeyed. We passed the bride’s carriage. I didn’t look at it, and old Forster turned his head away and cursed. We got home before it did.

We stood in the entrance of the house, in the bright afternoon sun, and soon we heard the sound of wheels on the gravel. When the carriage stopped in front of the steps, old Forster and I hurried down.

“My God, the carriage is empty! And yet——”

I quickly opened the door, and this is what I saw—

No sign of John Charrington; and of May, his wife, just a heap of white satin lying partly on the floor of the carriage and partly on the seat.

“I drove straight here, sir,” said the driver, as the bride’s father lifted her out; “and I’ll swear no one got out of the carriage.”

We carried her into the house in her wedding dress and pulled back her veil. I saw her face. Will I ever forget it? It was white, white and tight with pain and fear, showing such terror as I have never seen since except in dreams. And her hair, her bright blonde hair, I tell you it was white like snow.

As we stood, her father and I, almost crazy with the horror and mystery of it, a boy came up the driveway—a telegram boy. They gave me the orange envelope. I ripped it open.

“Mr. Charrington was thrown from the cart on his way to the station at half-past one. Killed on the spot!”

And he was married to May Forster in our local church at half-past three, in front of half the local people.

“I will be married, dead or alive!”

What happened in that carriage on the way home? No one knows—no one will ever know. 

Before a week was over, they buried her next to her husband in our small churchyard on the hill covered with thyme—the churchyard where they used to meet when they were in love.

This was John Charrington’s wedding.

THE END