Suddenly I stop short in the middle of the road and burst into irrepressible laughter.
"What is it?" asks Mr. Carrington, who is smiling in sympathy.
"Oh that sneeze!" I say when I can speak "coming just in the middle of your proposal. Could anything have been so unsuitable, so utterly out of place? That odious little convulsion! I shall always think of the whole scene with abhorrence."
"Suppose I propose to you all over again?" suggests Mr. Carrington. "It is impossible you can bring it in so unfortunately a second time; and you can then recollect the important event with more complaisance."
"No, no. A second addition would be flat, stale, and unprofitable; and besides, it does not really matter, does it? Only I suppose it would be more correct to feel grave and tearful, instead of comical, on such occasions."
"Nothing matters," exclaims Marmaduke, fervently, seizing my hand and kissing it, "since you have promised to be my wife. And soon Phyllis—is it not so?"
"Oh, no; certainly not soon," I return, decidedly. "There is plenty of time. There is no hurry; and I do not want to be married for ever so long."
My lover's countenance falls.
"What do you mean by 'ever so long?'" he asks.
"Two or three years, perhaps."