church. There was not a soul there save the two whom I had followed and a

surpliced clergyman, who seemed to be expostulating with them. They were all

three standing in a knot in front of the altar. I lounged up the side aisle

like any other idler who has dropped into a church. Suddenly, to my surprise,

the three at the altar faced round to me, and Godfrey Norton came running as

hard as he could towards me.


“‘Thank God,’ he cried. ‘You’ll do. Come!

Come!’


“‘What then?’ I asked.


“‘Come, man, come, only three minutes, or it won’t be

legal.’


“I was half-dragged up to the altar, and before I knew where I was I

found myself mumbling responses which were whispered in my ear, and vouching

for things of which I knew nothing, and generally assisting in the secure tying

up of Irene Adler, spinster, to Godfrey Norton, bachelor. It was all done in an

instant, and there was the gentleman thanking me on the one side and the lady

on the other, while the clergyman beamed on me in front. It was the most

preposterous position in which I ever found myself in my life, and it was the

thought of it that started me laughing just now. It seems that there had been

some informality about their license, that the clergyman absolutely refused to

marry them without a witness of some sort, and that my lucky appearance saved

the bridegroom from having to sally out into the streets in search of a best

man. The bride gave me a sovereign, and I mean to wear it on my watch chain in

memory of the occasion.”


“This is a very unexpected turn of affairs,” said I; “and

what then?”


“Well, I found my plans very seriously menaced. It looked as if the pair

might take an immediate departure, and so necessitate very prompt and energetic

measures on my part. At the church door, however, they separated, he driving

back to the Temple, and she to her own house. ‘I shall drive out in the

park at five as usual,’ she said as she left him. I heard no more. They