‘ “ ‘Very well,’ you said very earnestly, ‘I mean to be your wife. You and I shall be man and wife.’
‘ “ ‘Oh, of course,’ I said; ‘you shall be Madame Theodora.’ ”
‘ “Yes; but I was a simple child then,” Annita said, “a child that played with dolls. I did not know what I was saying; besides that, my dolls were husband and wife, don’t you know.”
‘ “No, you did not know what you said, that is certain enough; but now you are a grown-up young woman, Annita, you are no longer a child.”
‘ “No, I am nearly twenty.”
‘ “And sensible.”
‘ “No, not particularly.” [[60]]
‘ “And pretty.”
‘ “Am I?”
‘ “Yes, you certainly are; yes, so pretty that I cannot any longer be your brother.”