“Mr. Smith, it is impossible.”
“No, not impossible, Pandora. Not impossible. Do not say that; it will kill me. Listen! Have you ever dreamed of a home upon the wide and boundless prairie? A sweet little home, two stories and an attic, painted white with green shutters, where you can see eighteen miles in a straight line, where two hundred acres in potatoes lie beneath your very window, and where you can hunt the bounding buffalo and the prairie-hen without going off the estate; and where copper-colored servant girls can be had for two dollars a month and found? Have you ever dreamed of such a home?”
“Never.”
“It is to it I would bear you as my bride. Come with me! Be mine! I cannot offer you the enervating luxuries of the depraved and decaying East, but together we can feast upon jerked beef and buffalo tongues; together we can drink draughts from the Artesian well in the cellar; together we will sit beneath the tree by the front door, the only one within twenty-seven miles, and together we can watch the dog chasing the jackass-rabbits across the sage brush. Be mine, and I will stock the pantry with rations from the nearest Indian agency, where I have a friend; I will buy you a suave and gentle mule for you to exercise yourself on, and you may have canvas enough to paint General Washingtons and Lord Cornwallises as high as church steeples, and I will guarantee that Congress shall bid them in as fast as you turn them out. Will you, Pandora? Do you like the promise? Oh, say that you love me!”
“Mr. Smith, I cannot. I am very sorry, but to tell the truth plainly, I am engaged to another gentleman.”
“To Dunwoody?”
“I did not mention his name, sir.”
“But I know him! A one-legged Major! And you refuse me for him?”
“I refuse you; that is enough.”
“Oh, very well, Miss M’Duffy. I understand you. I will bid you a very good evening. I hope you will not have occasion to regret your decision.”