"It makes a man old before his time to have to meet you day by day and live near you."
"Why don't you try living with me?" she retorted. "Ah, then, you meant me when you said to Mrs. Crozier that you were going to be married? Wasn't that a bit 'momentary'? as my mother's cook used to remark. I think we haven't 'kept company'—you and I"
"It's true you haven't been a beau of mine, but I'd rather marry you than be obliged to live with you," was the paradoxical retort.
"You have me this time," he said, trying in vain to solve her reply.
Kitty tossed her head. "No, I haven't got you this time, thank Heaven, and I don't want you; but I'd rather marry you than live with you, as I said. Isn't it the custom for really nice-minded people to marry to get rid of each other—for five years, or for ever and ever and ever?"
"What a girl you are, Kitty Tynan!" he said reprovingly. He saw that she meant Crozier and his wife.
Kitty ceased her work for an instant and, looking away from him into the distance, said: "Three people said those same words to me all in one day a thousand years ago. It was Mr. Crozier, Jesse Bulrush, and my mother; and now you've said it a thousand years after; as with your inexpensive education and slow mind you'd be sure to do."
"I have an idea that Mrs. Crozier said the same to you also this very day. Did she—come, did she?"
"She didn't say, 'What a girl you are!' but in her mind she probably did say, 'What a vixen!"'
The Young Doctor nodded satirically. "If you continued as you began when coming from the station, I'm sure she did; and also I'm sure it wasn't wrong of her to say it."