She dropped her eyes, the very essence of humility. Her acting was beyond praise, and calculated to deceive a man very much less simple than Gerald Arkel.
"Dearest!" He clasped her in his arms; "and you will be my wife?"
"Don't, Gerald; you mustn't—besides, someone might see!"
"Well, let them—I don't care!"
"But I do." She released herself and sat down on the stile—the same by which Gerald had met Miriam for the first time. "Now do sit down, and do be sensible. You really must not behave like this. If I engage myself to you it must be on certain conditions."
"Make any conditions you like, darling, so long as you say 'yes.'"
"Very well, then, I make two. The first is that you are to keep our engagement an absolute secret until I give you leave to announce it. And the second is—well, the second is, you must be just the same before people."
"Well, naturally—if I agree to the first I must agree to the second. But I confess, dear, I don't like this sort of thing. Besides, I can't see the necessity for it. You aren't ashamed of me I hope?"
"Oh, Gerald, you dear goose—what nonsense! Haven't I told you that Uncle B. will make an awful fuss about it? That of itself should be enough for you. He is quite capable of altering his will."
"And in that case you wouldn't marry me, I suppose?"