That is what George asked me, and out of all the long talk we had this evening this is the one thing which I keep hearing over and over. Why should it tease me so? It is certainly a simple question, and when two persons have been engaged six years there need no longer be any false sensitiveness about things of this sort. About what sort? Do I mean that the time has come when George would not mind hurting my feelings? It may as well come out. As Father used to say: "You cannot balance the books until the account is set down in full." Well, then, I mean that there is a frankness about a long engagement which may not be in a short one, so that when George and I meet after a separation it is natural that almost the first question should be,—
"How long is it that we have been engaged?"
The question is certainly an innocent one,—although one would think George might have answered it himself. How much did the fact that he talked afterward so eagerly about the Miss West he met while at his aunt's, and of how pretty she is, have to do with the pain which the question gave me? At my age one might think that I was beyond the jealousies of a school-girl.
We have been engaged six years and four months and five days. It is not half the time that Jacob served for Rachel, although it is almost the time he bowed his neck to the yoke for Leah, and I am afraid lest I am nearer to being like the latter than the former. I always pitied Leah, for she must have understood she had not her husband's love; any woman would perceive that. Six years—and life is so short! Poor George, it has not been easy for him! He has not even been able to wish that the obstacle between us was removed, since that obstacle is Mother. Surely she is my first duty; and since she needs me day and night, I cannot divide my life; but I do pity George. He is wearing out his youth with that old frump of a housekeeper, who makes him uncomfortable with an ingenuity that seems to show intellectual force not to be suspected from anything else. But she is a faithful old soul, and it is not kind to abuse her.
"How long is it that we have been engaged?"
I have a tendency to keep on writing that over and over all down the page as if this were the copy-book of a child at school. How Tom used to admire my writing-books in our school-days! His were always smudged and blotted. He is too big-souled and manly to niggle over little things; and he laughed at the pains I took, turning every corner with absurd care. He was so strong and splendid on the ice when we went skating over on Getchell's Pond; and how often and often he has drawn me all the way home on my sled!
But all that was ages and ages ago, and long before I even knew George. It never occurred to me until to-night, but I am really growing old. The birthdays that Tom remembered, and on which he sent me little bunches of Mayflowers, have not in the least troubled me or seemed too many. I have not thought much of birthdays of late years, but to-night I realize that I am twenty-nine, and that George has asked me,—
"How long is it that we have been engaged?"
January 7. Sackcloth and ashes have been my portion for days, and if I could by tearing from my diary the last leaves blot out of remembrance the foolish things I have written, it would be quickly done. My New Year's resolutions were even less lasting than are those in the jokes of the comic papers; and I am ashamed all through and through. I have tried to reason myself into something resembling common sense, but I am much afraid I have not yet entirely accomplished it. I have said to myself over and over that it would be the best thing for George if he did fall in love with that girl he saw at Franklin, and go his way without wasting more time waiting for me. He has wasted years enough, and it is time for him to be happy. But then—has he not been happy? Or is it that I have been so happy myself I have not realized how the long engagement was wearying him? He must have wearied, or he could never have asked me—
No, I will not write it!