had too much rain in April and nothing but sweet sunshine and mad
moonlight ever since."

Most Green Valley courtships and weddings are conducted in a more or
less public and leisurely fashion and elopements are rare. Green
Valley was at first inclined to be a little shocked and resentful about
this performance. Weddings do not happen every day and Green Valley
was so accustomed to knowing weeks beforehand what the bride was going
to wear, and how many of the two sets of relatives were to be there,
and who was giving presents and what, and what the refreshments were
going to cost, and just how much more this was than what the bride's
mother could afford to spend, that there was a little murmur of
astonishment, resentment even, when it was found that just a bare, bald
marriage had been perpetrated in the old town. Green Valley did not
resent the scandal of the occurrence. It was the absence of details
that was so maddening. But gradually these began to trickle from
doorstep to doorstep and by nightfall Green Valley was crowding out of
its front gates with little wedding gifts under its arms.

It seems that little, meek, eighteen-year-old Alice Sears had eloped
with twenty-one-year-old Tommy Winston. She explained her foolishness
in a little letter which she left on the kitchen table for her mother.
The letter ran something like this:


Dear Mother:--

It's no use waiting any longer for any of the good times or new dresses
you said I'd have by and by. We never have any good times and I'm
tired waiting for a real new hat. Tommy's going to buy me one with