Page:The Strange Case of Miss Annie Spragg (1928).djvu/223

 

Bessie was married to Mr. Winnery at the registry office in the presence of three employees of the ship chandler's firm of Winnery and Company. Mr. Blundon managed to leave his book long enough to be present. He looked very nice in the new clothes Bessie and Mr. Winnery bought him for the occasion.

And Bessie, dressed in the finery lavished upon her by an adoring bridegroom, went on her bridal tour to Paris. They stayed at the Grand Hotel, where Bessie had but to open her window at any hour of the day or night to look out upon the crowds and gayety of the boulevards. They went to music halls and dined each night in a different restaurant and climbed the Eiffel Tower and visited the races and were astonished by the chocolate splendor of the opera. Mr. Winnery was happy as a boy and Paris became for them only a glorified Brighton.

It was only when Bessie went back to the house in Bloomsbury that she became aware for the first time in her life of that mental state known as temptation. The house bore the imprint of the late Amanda Winnery, a religious woman and a stout believer until her death in the professions of the Plymouth Brethern. The furniture was mostly of black teakwood and red plush embellished by a large amount of inlaid funereal marble. In each room framed legends set forth such thoughts as These had been