He sat down beside her, not so much to help her wrestle with the problem as to encourage her to speak. She was thoughtful. “I guess I don’t want to,” she continued, but with increasing doubt.
“You don’t want to marry? Why?”
“I wouldn’t be free,” she declared in an uncertain way.
“Why not?” he demanded. “You’d be free? You could do what you want. I wouldn’t stop you?”
She shook her head.
An idea came to him. “Maybe you’d rather—” but he stopped, remembering a former experience.
“Go ahead,” she advised him.
“You’ll get sore again,” he protested.
“No, I won’t,” she disagreed, but anticipated him with: “I know what you were goin’ to say.”
“You do? Well?”