Minister Lancer irritably drummed his fingers on the armchair Mrs. Masters had offered him. Unable to wrangle some other poor sap into marrying the unhappy couple, he arrived at the church hours before the wedding was to be held in order to make sure that everything was in place and to practice his facial expressions so as to not give away his annoyance. After waiting for two hours with nobody showing up, the irritated minister marched himself straight to the Masters mansion to see if the wedding had been called off. Unfortunately for him, it had not. Apparently, the bride had gone and run off. He joined the search party, but found no bride. And now here he was four hours later in the parlor glaring into space. Not that anyone noticed. They were all doing the exact same thing except for the smiling old woman in the wheelchair. A large clock chimed at some other part of the house. At the eighth chime, Minister Lancer finally stood up and marched himself to the front door.
"Around the World in Eighty Days, I've waited long enough! I'm going home! If your daughter ever decides to finally grace us with her presence, please find some other fool to go along with this wedding!"
"Here, Minister," Mrs. Masters said as she stood up to follow him, "Let Bertrand call a carriage for you. And again, I do sincerely apologize for the inconvience we've caused."
Upon hearing his name, the extremely short butler followed the two out into the hallway repeating his employer's apologies.
"It's not her that ought to be apologizing," Pamela said angrily as she glared out into the night sky, "I cannot believe that Samantha would be so foolish enough to pull such a childish prank!"
"You've finally realized it now, dearie?"
"Realized what, you useless wart?"
"That she's not pulling a prank. That she's actually ran away on purpose."
"Oh, just shut up, you old hobgoblin! This is just as much as your fault as it hers!"
"How?"
"You saw her run off! You could have stopped her!"
"Pamela!" Jeremy glared at her from the Chesterfield sofa, "She's in a wheelchair! It's not like she could go chasing off after Samantha!"
"She seemed perfectly capable of chasing off after me at yesterday's corset fiasco!"
"It's not like I knew Sam was going to run off," Ida argued, "She looked like she was about to be sick and ran straight back into the house! That was the last time I saw her!"
"You stupid insect! She must have been faking and ran away when you weren't looking!"
"Look," Dashiel sighed wearily from his chair, "If she's not here, does that mean I don't have to marry her anymore?"
"No, it does not," his mother answered sternly as she walked in and sat back down, "The wedding will continue as planned."
"I don't know if it's escaped your notice, dearie, but the plan has now gone entirely out the window."
"Shut up, you old crow!"
"Moth- Oh, forget it. I give up," Jeremy held up his glass, "Another brandy, if you please Bertrand."
"You know," Star said nervously as she looked out the window, "This is a huge place. What if she got lost?"
"Samantha's not lost," Pamela grumbled, "She's hiding from us."
"Or from you, dearie."
"Enough, you pesky vermin! Samantha has to have realized by now that she's gone quite far enough with this tomfoolery."
"Tom Foolery?" Dash looked puzzled, "Who's Tom Foolery? Can't he marry her instead?"
Mrs. Masters let out a soft groan as Bertrand patted her shoulder in sympathy.
"Besides," Jeremy picked up from where his wife left off, "I thought we searched this entire place. No Samantha."
"And you don't think that's even a tiny bit odd?" Ida asked, "We've searched this entire place and found no Samantha."
"He just said that, you stupid lump."
"Let me finish, dearie. If we didn't find Samantha anywhere on this property, then how could she still be hiding here?"
Pamela looked as if she wanted to argue, but couldn't find a reasonable answer to her mother-in-law's question. Instead she harrumphed and turned back towards the window.
"Maybe she's in the cemetary?" Mrs. Masters offered.
"We already looked there," Dashiel whined.
"I'm telling you," Pamela insisted, "She's playing a practical joke."
"Still," Star continued, "It is getting rather dark out. What if something happened to her? Maybe we should call the police."
"No!" Mrs. Masters immediatly stood to her feet. Upon seeing that she had inadvertently gotten everyone's attention, she calmly sat back down. "I mean, no. I don't think the police will be necessary."
"Of course you wouldn't, dearie."
"What exactly is that supposed to mean?"
"I think you know, dearie."
"What are you talking about, you silly crone?" Pamela demanded.
"She knows, dearie."
"If I may remind you," Mrs. Masters said through gritted teeth, "Those allegations were proven to be false."
"I wonder why, dearie."
"Will you stop causing so much trouble, you pompous nitwit!"
"Because," Mrs. Masters continued calmly, "I didn't do anything."
"Of course you didn't, dearie."
"Jeremy!" Pamela shouted at her husband, "Will you do something!"
"I am. I'm enjoying a nice beverage."
"You know what I meant!"
He sipped on his drink and continued to ignore the fight. With a frustrated growl, his wife glared at Ida before addressing Mrs. Masters.
"Please forgive her. She's rather old and cranky. And of course all this stress that Samantha has gone and caused isn't helping anything."
"No," Mrs. Masters stood up, "It's certainly isn't. In fact, it's not helping me, either. Come along Bertrand. I going to bed."
"Me too," Dashiel got up, "I'm not waiting around forever for that little bitch not to show up."
"Jeremy and I are going to bed, too," Pamela pulled him up by his collar and dragged him behind her, "Whether or not the old sack of of spiders wants to retire, I don't care."
"But," the maid asked, "What about Ms. Manson? She's still missing. We have to do something!"
"We'll wait until tomorrow. She'll get bored of this silly game by then and we can finally get on with this wedding!"
"But-"
"Don't bother, dearie. The little demoness has to always have her way. Besides, no one's going to do anything tonight. Not even the police. Sam hasn't been missing long enough."
"But, she's not going to come back, is she?"
"No. And good for her, too."
"So, what do we do? Nothing?"
"I think so, dearie," Ida sighed as she left the room, "But I must admit, as glad as I am that Sam's finally escaped this circus, I can't help but worry. Something's just not right about this."
