‘Look here,’ says Crosby presently; ‘too much happiness is bad for any man. Now, you sit over there’—putting her into a far corner of the old garden-seat—‘and I’ll sit here’—seating himself with the sternest virtue at the other end. ‘Don’t come within a mile of me again for a while, and let us be sensible and talk business. When will you marry me—next week?’
‘Next week?’—with a laugh—‘is that talking business?’
‘The best business.’
‘Oh, nonsense!’
‘Where does the nonsense come in? I’ve been waiting all my life for you, and what’s the good of waiting any longer—even a day? See here, now, Susan. In seven days you could——’
‘I could not, indeed!’ She breaks off suddenly. ‘You are coming nearer.’
‘So I am,’ says he, sighing, and moving back to his corner. ‘Good Susan! Keep reminding me, will you?’
‘I certainly shall,’ says Susan, who has perhaps been only half understood up to this.
‘Well, if not next week—next month?’
‘Oh no,’ says Susan. ‘In a year perhaps I——’