“I can't answer you. You must give me time—time to consider, to consult my sister, to make up my mind.”
We had been strolling together, he and I, up and down the sands. Now we returned to the inn. Josephine was seated on the verandah, near the entrance.
“Ah, Leonard, at last!” she exclaimed, starting up the moment she caught sight of me. “I have been waiting for you.”
I accompanied her to her room.
“Well,” she began, as soon as the door was closed behind us, “the worst has happened, as I suppose you know. Mr. Fairchild has spoken to you, has he not?”
“Ah! Then you, too, know about it?” queried I.
“Miriam has just told me the whole story.”
“What does she say?”
“That Mr. Fairchild has asked her to be his wife; that she loves him, and has accepted him—conditionally, that is, upon your approval.”
“She says she loves him?”