"Mother said that the year's engagement was so that you and Captain Forrester should learn to be quite sure of yourselves. Now, how are you to be any surer of yourselves than you are now if you don't get to know one another any better? And how are you going to know one another any better if you never see one another, and never write to one another?"
Joyce paused before she replied. She lifted her eyes and fixed them on the channel, of which the long, tortuous curves, winding across the marsh to the sea, were blue now with an opaque color in the growing grayness of the evening.
"Perhaps mother don't wish us to know one another any better. Perhaps she wishes us to forget one another," said she at last, slowly.
"I know mother wants you to forget one another, because she wants you to marry the squire," said I, bluntly, "but father doesn't."
"Oh, Meg, don't," whispered Joyce.
"Well, of course you know it," laughed I, a little ashamed of myself, "and you know that I know it. But you never would have married him, dear, so mother is none the worse off if you marry Captain Forrester, and you are not going to forget him because they want you to."
"No," murmured she. "But oh, Meg," she added, hastily rising too, and taking my hand, "I don't want you to say anything to them about it. It's settled now, and it's far best as it is. I had far rather let it be, and take my chance."
"What do you mean by taking your chance?" cried I. "You mean to say that you can trust to your lover not to forget you? Well, I suppose you can. He worships you, and I suppose one may fairly expect even a man to be faithful one little year. But, meanwhile, you will both of you be unhappy instead of being comparatively happy, as you would be if you could write to one another and see one another sometimes. Now, that seems to me to be useless, and I don't see why it need be. At all events, I shall try to prevent it."
"You're a good, faithful old Meg, as true as steel," said Joyce, tenderly, taking my hand; "and I suppose you can't understand how I feel, because we are so different. But I want you to believe that I would much rather wait. Indeed, I would much rather wait."