“Yes, Roland,” she said.
“Muriel, Muriel, I love you; I want you to marry me. Will you?”
She blushed prettily. “But, Roland, you know; if father and mother say yes, of course.”
In the sudden release of feeling he was uncertain what exactly was expected of a person whose proposal had been accepted. They were on the brink of another embarrassed silence, but Muriel saved them.
“Roland,” she said, “you’re hurting my fingers awfully!”
With a laugh he dropped her hands, and that laugh restored them to their former intimacy.
“Oh, Roland,” she said, “what fun we shall have when we are married.”
He asked whether she thought her parents would be pleased, and she was certain that they would.
“They like you so much.” Then she insisted on his telling when and how he had first discovered that he was in love with her. “Come along; let’s sit on the gate and you shall tell me all about it. Now, when was the first time, the very first time, that you thought you were in love with me?”
“Oh, but I don’t know.”