"For swearing," he replied. "I forgot you didn't like it."
"Oh!" said Dot; and after a pause, "Then I beg yours."
"Did you do it on purpose?" he asked curiously.
"I want to get down, please," said Dot.
He lowered her from his shoulder to his arms with perfect ease, set her on the ground, and held her fast.
"Dot," he said, his voice sunk almost to a whisper, "if you're going to be violent, I guess I shall be violent too."
"Let me go!" said Dot.
But still he held her. "Dot," he said again. "I won't hustle you any. I swear I won't hustle you. But—my dear, you'll marry me some day. Isn't that so?"
Dot was silent. She was straining against his arms, and yet he held her, not fiercely, not passionately, but with a mastery the greater for its very coolness.
"I'll wait for you," he said. "I'll wait three years. I shall be twenty-five then, and you'll be twenty-one. But you'll marry me then, Dot. You'll have to marry me then."