She gave a little laugh of excitement. What fun it all was! She wondered if other people felt like this, when they were getting married. They probably knew all about it?
Oh yes, of course; she'd go by his letter....
But no; because when he wrote they were not engaged!
So finally she thought it best to leave a blank and start straight off—
"I really don't know at all what I ought to say. I am no good at letters and this is very difficult, but I too enjoyed all our walks and things, and if you really want to marry me I don't see why we shouldn't be engaged. I liked you very much down here and hope I shall make you happy. Mother doesn't seem very keen about it, I think she thinks I am too young though I am twenty, but she has given her consent and will, I am sure, come round to it, so don't worry.
"I'm afraid you'll think this letter very stupid, but you know how ashamed I always was of my ignorance. I seem to know nothing! It is very nice indeed of any one like you to care for me.
"Yours,
"HELENA HALLAM.
"P.S.—You won't be able to tease me any more about my name, afterwards!"
Perhaps to any real anthologist or expert of love-letters this would seem but little better than the attempt it answered; yet if success must be judged by results, it cannot have been much amiss, since for the first time in his life Hubert Brett was melted to a display of ridiculous emotion. "Dear little girl!" he murmured aloud and kissed the last words before her signature.
As for Helena, having run out to the village and posted the letter unread by her mother—a cause of yet further misgiving to the theorist—she began to wonder ever so little whether she had done quite wisely.