“Wasn’t that enough to take the wind out of you, when you’d never given the idea of marriage a thought. Simply bowled me over. At first I refused point blank, but when I saw how cut up the poor old dad was about it I shook his hand and said: ‘Pater, done––I’ll go right out and find a wife.’ And I did.”
“What!” said Helen faintly. “You went right out and got married?”
“No, no, no, my dear cousin. I simply found Sadie.”
“And have you asked her? Not surely while we were here this afternoon.”
“Oh, I saw her later––when she came to-night with your aunt, while your aunt was searching all over the place for you. Not that I really asked her then, but we looked at each other, you know, and I think we liked each other––and that’s a big start. I just know we’ll get married––we’re soul-mates! There isn’t any doubt of it.”
“Well, it strikes me,” said Helen severely, “that you’re a trifle conceited.”
“Indeed I am,” was his startling response. “You’ve got to be, in love. If you don’t think you’re pretty fine how are you going to convince anybody else that you are? But you’ll have to excuse me for a moment––these bracelets are cutting my wrists to pieces. I must find that man who locked me up. You must stay here till I come back––I won’t be a minute,” and the young man darted out of the room with a ludicrous diving motion of his arms as he parted the heavy crimson silk hangings at the doorway and caromed against the big policeman on guard.