A small voice, brisk and marvellously motherly, came from behind her.
‘That’s silly, Anna,’ said the Honourable Olive. ‘Being afraid is silly, you know it is.’
Anna turned and met the shining blue eyes of her chief and only bridesmaid. The Honourable Olive’s dress, like Anna’s, had been made by Mrs Bunford. The child had been given free reign for she was all of nine years old now, her natural taste beginning to form, and the white wreath and muslin dress were as simple as Anna’s own. But if ever there was a bridesmaid suffused with th sheer joy of living on such a splendid and dazzling day, that bridesmaid was Ollie Byrne.
And Anna smiled and laid her hand lightly on the bright curls, and turned to walk steadily to where Rupert waited: a man who had passed beyond all doubt and uncertainty - a man who had come home.