"A wondrous fine thing I've been told," was all that she said.
I turned to father, who had not spoken. "Well, anyhow, they're in love with one another," I repeated. "I know it as a fact, and he's coming here to-morrow morning to ask your leave to marry her."
"The devil he is!" ejaculated father, roused at last.
Mother dropped her knitting. I do believe her face grew white with horror.
"I always thought, Laban, it was a pity to have that young man about so much when we had grown-up girls at home," moaned she, quite forgetting my presence. "But you always would be so sure he was thinking of nothing but those politics of yours."
"To be sure, to be sure," murmured father.
"And he was always so pleasant to all of us," she went on, as though that, too, were something to deplore in him; "but I never did think he'd be wanting to marry a farmer's daughter. And I should like to know what he has got to marry any one upon," added she, after a pause, turning to me indignantly, as though I knew the captain's affairs any better than she did.
"His captain's pay," answered I, glibly, although I had been chilled for a moment by this remark. "And why should you consider him a ne'er-do-well because he earns his living in a different way to what you do? He kills the country's enemies, and you till the country's land. They are both honorable professions by which a man gets his bread by the sweat of his brow."
I looked at father; all through I had spoken only to him. He smiled and began to light his pipe. It was a sign that his mind was made up. Which way was it made up?
"Joyce is just the girl men do fall in love with," said I, wisely; "and as for her—well, you can't be surprised at her falling in love with a man whom you like so much yourself."